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BR  115  .S6  B433  1898 
Beaton,  David. 
Selfhood  &  service 


SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 


SELFHOOD  AND 
SERVICE 


THE  RELATION  OF  CHRISTIAN  PERSONALITY 
TO  WEALTH  AND  SOCIAL  REDEMPTION 


DAVID  "BEATON 


¥ 


CHICAGO:    NEW  YORK:    TORONTO 

FLEMING   H.  REVELL   COMPANY 
1898 


Copyright,  1898 
By  FLEMING  H.  REVELL  COMPANY 


TO   THE 

TRUSTEES  OF  OUR  CHRISTIAN  CHURCHES 

IN   WHOSE   RANKS  ARE  SO   MANY 

WHO   PRIVATELY  AND  PUBLICLY   EXEMPLIFY   THE   LEADING 

PRINCIPLE  REGARDING 

THE  USE   OF  WEALTH   ILLUSTRATED  IN   THESE   PAGES 


FOREWORD. 


It  is  hoped  there  is  a  message  in  these  pages 
interesting  alike  to  the  man  of  faith  and  the  man 
of  science,  more  interesting  where  the  two  are 
combined.  The  motive  of  the  writing  is  a  deep 
sympathy  with  the  weak,  who  are  forced  to  the 
wall  in  the  awful  industrial  contest  of  life — the 
defective,  the  dispossessed  in  our  present  social 
chaos.  The  strong  need  no  friends,  they  can 
fight  their  own  battles,  but  the  Christian  may 
well  say,  "Let  my  tongue  cleave  to  the  roof  of 
my  mouth,  and  let  my  arm  wither,  when  the  one 
shall  cease  to  plead  the  cause  of  the  poor  or  the 
other  refuse  to  defend  him."  But  the  facts  of 
Christian  history  and  the  stern  laws  of  life  must 
be  regarded.  A  permanent  social  order  can 
come  only  from  a  constructive  principle  which 
regards  those  facts  and  measures  those  laws. 
This  principle  is  set  forth  here,  at  once  consist- 
ent with  the  claims  of  personality  and  the  work 
of  social  redemption. 

David  Beaton. 

Chicago,  January,  1898. 


CONTENTS. 


I.    Social  Redemption  through  Christianity  n 

II.    The  Christian  Doctrine  of  Selfhood        -  21 

III.  Selfhood  the  Creator  of  Material  Wealth  30 

IV.  Selfhood  and  the  Intellectual  Progress  of 

Society 43 

V.    Selfhood  the  Agent  of  Social  Betterment  53 
VI.    The  Ministry  of  Wealth  in  Education  and 

Philanthropy 64 

VII.     Christian    Selfhood    Distinguished    from 

Worldly  Conformity       -        -        -        -  74 
VIII.     Personal  Service  the  New  Ideal  of  Chris- 
tianity            82 

IX.     Modern     Lessons    on    Christianity    and 

Wealth 92 

X.    Simplicity  of  Christian  Living      -        -  103 

XI.     Education  and  Family  Training       -        -  114 

XII.     Personal  Service  a  Privilege  of  Wealth  123 

XIII.  Personal   Service   a   Career  of    Distinc- 

tion       133 

XIV.  Business    an    Opportunity    of    Christian 

Service 145 

XV.     Personal  Administration  of  Accumulated 

Wealth 158 

XVI.     The  Family  Inheritance    -                 -        -  167 

XVII.    The  New  Christian  Civilization    -        -  182 

XVIII.    The  Scope  and  Sanity  of  the  New  Ideal  200 


SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 


I. 

SOCIAL   REDEMPTION   THROUGH 
CHRISTIANITY. 

Our  age  is  restless  and  critical.  Christianity 
has  borne  the  chief  brunt  of  this  insurgent 
spirit.  Reformers  have  been  impatient  with 
the  church,  and  said  their  hardest  things 
against  Christians.  Many  regard  this  criticism 
as  a  sign  of  enmity  to  religion,  and  see  in  it  the 
birth  of  a  new  movement  of  social  reform  which 
casts  aside  the  Christian  faith  and  the  guidance 
of  the  Christian  church.  More  careful  obser- 
vation of  the  thought  of  our  time  will,  however, 
lead  us  to  quite  an  opposite  conclusion. 

Why  do  the  earnest  thoughtful  men  and 
women,  like  the  majority  of  our  workers  in  the 
cause  of  social  redemption,  criticise  any  insti- 
tution like  the  church?  Just  because  it  pro- 
fesses to  be  able  to  cure  the  ills  of  human 
society  which  they  are  interested  in  healing. 
They  do  not  criticise  athletic  associations,  nor 
literary  societies  because  these  are  not  called 


12  SELFHOOD    AND    SERVICE. 

into  existence  for  the  moral  and  social  redemp- 
tion of  society.  But  this  is  one  of  the  main 
purposes  for  which  the  church  exists,  and  in 
the  accomplishment  of  which  Christianity 
achieves  her  most  splendid  victories. 

The  social  reformer  is  impatient  with  the 
methods  of  the  church  because  in  the  depth  of 
his  heart  he  regards  her  as  the  right  arm  of  the 
Lord  for  the  social  redemption  of  man. 

Certainly  the  most  touching,  as  it  is  also  the 
most  reassuring,  note  of  the  spirit  of  our  age,  is 
the  desire,  breaking  out  into  a  beseeching,  on 
the  part  of  all  social  workers,  that  the  church 
should  rouse  herself  from  her  indifference  to 
the  social  needs  of  the  people,  and  come  forth 
to-day,  as  in  the  early  days  of  her  poverty  and 
self-denial,  renewing  her  mighty  youth  in  the 
splendid  self  abandonment  of  the  Apostles  and 
the  early  disciples,  for  the  divine  ideal  of  social 
righteousness  and  the  prosperity  of  the  com- 
mon people.  Indeed  a  very  large  part  of  this 
severe  criticism  has  come  from  the  best  friends 
of  Christianity.  To  them,  the  weaknesses  and 
failures  of  the  church  as  an  instrument  of  social 
redemption  are  the  signs  of  a  deeper  degen- 
eracy in  her  life,  and  a  more  fatal  departure 
from  the  spirit  of  her  Founder  than  is  to  be 
seen  in  the  partial  failure  of  her  work  in  any 
one  particular  direction. 


SOCIAL   REDEMPTION.  13 

This  condition  is  regarded  by  them  as  evi- 
dence of  a  change  of  ideal  and  purpose ;  as  a 
fatal  conformity  to  the  world,  both  in  spirit 
and  practice.  We  know  that  the  first  Chris- 
tians won  their  triumphs  over  the  heathen 
world  by  the  virtues  born  of  poverty,  by  the 
heroic  qualities  of  peoples  inspired  by  noble 
ideals,  by  self-abnegation,  contempt  of  suffer- 
ing, and  disregard  of  death.  They  counted  not 
their  lives  dear  unto  them  for  the  love  of 
Christ. 

They  may  have  made  mistakes  in  their 
doctrines  of  political  economy,  but  a  new  spirit 
was  born  into  the  world,  clear-eyed,  tender- 
hearted, yet  masterful  and  splendid  in  pur- 
pose, which  changed  the  face  of  society  and 
brought  liberty,  purity,  peace,  and  prosperity 
to  the  enslaved  and  wretched  of  every  race, 
where  the  gospel  was  preached.  In  marked 
contrast  to  this  poverty  the  church  is  now  rich, 
beside  this  self-denial  the  modern  Christian  is 
luxurious,  and  compared  with  these  conquer- 
ing virtues  of  self-abnegation  and  heroism  for 
great  ideals,  we  have  prudence  and  worldly 
wisdom.  And  the  world  sees  the  sworn  sol- 
diers of  the  cross  thankful  if  they  can  secure 
their  own  ease  and  preserve  their  own  privi- 
leges, letting  society  and  its  wrongs  cautiously 
alone. 


1 4  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

Has  then,  the  modern  Christian  church 
completed  the  cycle  of  degeneracy  which 
all  conquerors  must  tread?  First,  the  poor  but 
strong  man,  hardy,  vigorous,  eager  for  con- 
quest, inspired  by  loyalty  or  splendid  race  tra- 
ditions, seeking  the  rich  and  fertile  lands  of 
the  south,  he  conquers  them  by  virtue  of  the 
physical  and  mental  prowess  created  by  pov- 
erty and  lofty  ideals.  Then  the  possessor, 
luxurious,  cultured,  self-indulgent,  wise  in  the 
conservative  maxims  of  letting  things  alone, 
indifferent  to  high  ideals,  and  in  his  turn,  the 
helpless  prey,  as  well  as  the  rich  prize  which 
tempts  the  invader. 

The  business  customs  and  social  ideals  of 
many  modern  Christians  give  far  too  much 
ground  for  the  assertion  that  such  a  fatal  cycle 
of  degeneracy  has  been  completed  by  the 
church  of  Christ  in  her  nineteen  hundred  years 
of  history.  And  if  this  charge  is  really  proved 
against  the  church,  no  class  of  workers  and 
thinkers  will  more  deeply  lament  the  fact  than 
those  who  long  for  a  purified  and  prosperous 
social  life.  The  patriot  who  hailed,  in  the 
robust  manliness  of  the  first  Christian's  faith, 
the  promise  of  a  new  type  of  manhood  and  a 
new  order  of  citizenship  laments  it.  The  so- 
cial reformer  and  thinker  who  saw,  in  the  new 
doctrines   of    a   common   brotherhood   for  all 


SOCIAL   REDEMPTION.  15 

men,  the  creative  forces  of  a  new  society  is  in 
despair.  But  the  Christian  who  looked  to  that 
faith  and  that  spirit  of  brotherhood,  not  only 
for  a  new  manhood,  a  new  citizenship,  and 
a  new  social  order,  but  a  divine  energy  to  re- 
generate the  human  soul  and  so  re-create  soci- 
ety from  the  heart  outward,  sees  the  door  of 
this  larger  hope  shut  in  his  face. 

The  Christian  believer  has  the  deepest  inter- 
est in  this  modern  controversy ;  for  it  is  vital 
to  his  faith.  Is  the  church  recreant  to  her 
trust?  Is  she  false  to  the  spirit  and  pur- 
pose of  her  Founder?  Are  her  ideals  to-day 
directly  opposed  to  those  of  the  first  Chris- 
tians? Has  she  failed  to  understand  or  been 
powerless  to  carry  out  the  commands  of  her 
Divine  Master?  Is  it  true  that  the  practices 
and  ideals  of  the  great  mass  of  His  professed 
followers  are  rather  pagan  than  Christian? 
Has  the  church,  by  this  conformity,  to  world- 
ly ideals  of  life,  lost  those  healing  and  regen- 
erating energies,  which  alone  make  her  the 
savior  of  men  and  society? 

The  charges,  which  both  her  enemies  and 
friends  have  brought  against  the  church,  are 
almost  entirely  connected  with  her  doctrine 
and  practices  regarding  wealth.  Coming  into 
existence  as  a  spiritual  force,  and  at  the  behest 
of  a  spiritual  leader,  Christianity  soon  became 


1 6  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

a  power  in  temporal  affairs  and  a  producer  of 
material  as  well  as  spiritual  blessings  for  her 
followers.  It  is  a  notorious  fact  that  the  vast 
preponderance  of  material  wealth  created  dur- 
ing the  past  fifty  years  is  owned  by  the  pro- 
fessed followers  of  Jesus  Christ. 

At  present  the  writer  is  building  no  doc- 
trine on  this  industrial  fact;  he  simply  wishes 
it  to  be  strongly  impressed  upon  the  mind 
of  the  reader.  It  is  well  for  us,  also,  to  con- 
fine ourselves  to  the  latter  half  of  the  pres- 
ent century  for  definiteness  of  illustration, 
because  of  the  unprecedented  increase  in 
wealth  which  has  taken  place  during  that 
period  from  the  scientific  discoveries  and  me- 
chanical improvements  of  the  age. 

It  does  not  concern  our  subject  to  discuss 
here  whether  the  methods,  by  which  this  wealth 
has  been  accumulated,  have  been  wrong  eco- 
nomically or  morally.  It  is  simply  laid  down 
as  a  fact,  vitally  related  to  the  work  of  the 
church  in  the  world,  that  her  members  own 
and  control  the  vast  and  unprecedented  accu- 
mulations of  modern  wealth  both  in  Europe 
and  America.  Not  only  is  wealth  thus  accu- 
mulated, but  it  is  being  concentrated  in  these 
latter  days  in  vast  fortunes  in  the  hands  of  a 
few  individuals  and  families.  Thomas  G.  Sher- 
man estimates  the  wealth  of  America  as  nine- 


SOCIAL   REDEMPTION.  17 

ty-five  thousand  millions  of  dollars.  His 
figures  concerning  the  concentration  of  this 
wealth  have  not  been  seriously  disputed.  In 
1889  he  showed  that  forty-five  thousand  per- 
sons owned  more  than  half  of  all  the  wealth  of 
America.  On  the  basis  of  the  tax  returns  182 
families  owned  $43,000,000,000,  1,200,000 
families  owned  $7,000,000,000,  and  11,620,- 
000  families  owned  $11,215,000,000  of  the 
national  wealth. 

These  startling  figures  are  not  set  down 
here  for  a  discussion  of  the  economic  and 
legislative  questions  that  arise  out  of  them ; 
but  to  place  before  the  reader  some  of  the  facts 
of  modern  social  and  industrial  life  that  arouse 
the  interest  of  the  Christian  socialist,  as  well  as 
the  alarm  of  the  patriot. 

Here  then,  are  two  circumstances  closely 
related,  both  in  the  popular  mind,  and  in 
the  thought  of  educated  social  workers. 
First,  that  the  vast  accumulations  of  wealth 
in  modern  times  are  in  the  possession  of 
Christian  people,  and  second  that  this  wealth 
is  being  steadily  and  even  rapidly  concen- 
trated in  a  few  families.  In  startling  con- 
trast to  this  is  the  continued  hardship,  suffer- 
ing and  perplexity  of  a  vast  mass  of  the  peo- 
ple. Sir  Robert  Peel  said  many  years  ago  that 
the  condition  of  the  laboring  man  was  a  dis- 


1 8  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

grace  and  danger  to  our  civilization.  "There 
is  too  much  suffering  and  too  much  perplexity 
in  his  lot ;  it  is  absolutely  necessary  that  we 
should  render  the  conditions  of  the  manual 
laborer  less  hard  and  less  precarious."  Since 
those  words  were  spoken  by  the  great  repre- 
sentative of  the  best  in  the  old  aristocracy  of 
England  many  revolutions  in  politics,  econo- 
mics, and  social  conditions  have  taken  place ; 
and  the  greater  number  of  them  have  been  di- 
rectly aimed  at  improving  the  lot  of  the  labor- 
ing man. 

It  is  hardly  an  exaggeration  to  say  that  the 
most  splendid  achievements  of  reform  during 
the  past  sixty  years  have  been  almost  entirely 
in  the  interests  of  the  middle  and  working 
classes.  The  material  benefits  resulting  from 
the  discoveries  of  science  and  the  improve- 
ments in  machinery  have  accrued  almost 
entirely  to  the  benefit  of  those  same  classes. 
Indeed  the  fame  of  the  great  men  and  women 
of  the  same  period  has  largely  been  derived 
from  measures  passed  in  the  interest  of,  and 
works  done  for,  the  laboring  classes.  This  only 
shows  how  deep  was  the  ditch  out  of  which 
the  laborer  had  to  be  dug.  It  reveals  his 
former  moral  and  social  degradation,  when  we 
reflect  how  much  was  required  to  be  done  to 
make  the  life  of  the  manual  worker  endurable 


SOCIAL   REDEMPTION.  19 

and  worth  living.  Society  could  not  have  ex- 
isted in  the  old  forms  for  fifty  years  longer, 
except  for  those  measures  of  industrial  reform, 
and  social  amelioration.  But  statesmen  and 
reformers  found  that  they  had  only  scratched 
the  surface.  Lower  deeps  of  misery  and  want 
were  brought  to  light  imperatively  demanding 
relief. 

There  are  vast  areas  of  population  both  in 
Europe  and  America  as  degraded,  oppressed, 
and  hopelessly  miserable  as  the  classes  who 
were  the  shame  and  terror  of  England  during 
the  corn-law  hunger  and  chartist  riots. 

Besides  all  this,  the  common  people  are  being 
rapidly  educated.  They  know  that  they  are  poor 
in  the  midst  of  plenty,  miserable  in  the  midst 
of  joy,  and  yet  are  in  possession  of  political 
power  which  they  have  been  taught-  to  regard 
as  the  doorway  to  prosperity.  The  revela- 
tions of  Booth  and  Riis  and  many  others  con- 
cerning the  life  of  the  very  poor  in  our  large 
cities,  are  alone  grave  indictments  against 
modern  governments  and  the  church. 

The  vices,  miseries,  and  sorrows  of  the  sub- 
merged classes  remain  therefore  a  just  charge 
against  modern  Christianity.  Simply  because 
the  church  of  Christ  exists  for  the  purpose  of 
abolishing  those  evils  and  healing  those  sorrows. 
She  is  accepted  by  the  world  at  her  own  ap- 


20  SELFHOOD  AND   SERVICE. 

praisement.  For  this  end  she  was  born  into 
the  world.  This  is  the  source  of  her  power 
and  her  honor.  She  could  furnish  no  stronger 
evidence  of  her  own  degeneracy  from  the  spirit 
and  purpose  of  her  Master  than  resentment 
of  this  criticism  and  refusal  to  hear  this  trum- 
pet call  to  her  highest  duty. 


II. 

THE  CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE  OF  SELFHOOD. 

It  should  occasion  no  surprise  that  the  accu- 
mulation and  use  of  wealth  by  Christians  are 
made  the  tests  of  genuine  Christianity  by  so- 
cial reformers,  because  these  subjects  are 
vitally  related  to  the  particular  interests  which 
they  have  at  heart.  To  them  this  is  real  and 
concrete  Christianity.  With  them  social  bet- 
terment is  inseparably  connected  with  the  pos- 
session of  wealth,  its  absence  is  invariably  con- 
nected with  social  degradation  and  misery. 
Material  prosperity  is,  and  that  justly,  their 
test  of  social  improvement.  Christianity  itself 
has  -taught  them  this  much,  as  we  shall  pres- 
ently see. 

It  is  small  wonder  then  that  schemes  of 
social  betterment  take  the  form  of  appeals  to 
Christians  to  surrender  possession,  or  to  re- 
strict accumulation,  or  distribute  their  capital 
among  the  less  fortunate  members  of  society. 
Jesus  had  not  where  to  lay  his  head,  Paul  was 
poor,  the  early  Christians  were  poor;  Chris- 
tians to-day,  if  they  would  be  like  their  Mas- 

21 


22  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

ter,  must  be  poor; — such  is  the  reasoning,  open 
or  implied,  in  many  of  the  plans  of  the  Social- 
ist for  the  regeneration  of  society. 

Christians,  by  virtue  of  their  wealth  and  cul- 
ture, are  now  members  of  the  privileged  classes, 
and  use  their  money  and  influence  for  sel- 
fish ends,  and  on  the  side  of  the  world-power, 
instead  of  assisting  the  cause  of  the  poor  and 
for  social  justice  and  equal  industrial  opportu- 
nity. Such  is  the  arraignment  of  the  modern 
Christian  by  the  social  reformer. 

Society  demands  a  new  sacrifice  by  the 
church,  as  proof  of  her  power  to  save.  The  pov- 
erty, the  grinding  toil,  the  want  of  work  to 
the  willing  hands  that  make  a  bitter  chance 
of  the  poor  man's  lot,  the  inequality  and 
injustice  in  the  distribution  of  the  fruits  of 
his  toil,  and  the  thousand  social  and  economic 
evils  that  render  the  condition  of  the  poor  in- 
tolerable in  modern  society,  all  demand  of  the 
disciples  of  Jesus  Christ  healing  and  removal. 

In  those  very  necessities  of  life  where  the 
victims  of  our  present  social  order  are  weak, 
the  Christian  is  strong,  where  he  is  ignorant 
the  Christian  is  wise,  where  he  is  an  outcast, 
and  dispossessed,  the  Christian  is  a  son  of  priv- 
ilege and  heir  of  all  the  glories  of  our  Chris- 
tian civilization.  It  is  thus  seriously  main- 
tained that  the  possession  of  these  privileges 


THE   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE.  23 

which  wealth  and  culture  bring  in  the  course 
of  the  ages  have  changed  the  spirit  and  pur- 
pose of  the  church,  and  that  she  is  no  longer 
the  protector  of  the  weak  and  redresser  of  the 
wrongs  of  the  oppressed.  That  she  uses  her 
wealth  mainly  for  the  self-indulgent  luxury  of 
her  own  members  and  to  maintain  and  per- 
petuate the  privileges  of  a  class.  That,  in  a 
word,  there  is  complete  conformity  to  the 
world  in  the  spirit  and  practice  of  the  church 
to-day.  That  there  is  no  perceptible  differ- 
ence in  politics,  business,  or  social  ambitions 
between  the  Christian  professor  and  the  man 
of  the  world. 

So  that  self-interest,  self-indulgence,  self- 
culture,  self-glory,  are  the  ruling  instincts  of 
both  alike.  This  is  clearly  demonstrated,  it 
is  maintained,  in  the  eagerness  of  both  for 
the  accumulation  of  wealth  and  the  selfishness 
common  to  both  in  its  expenditure.  There  is 
only  one  way  to  cure  this  disease  of  worldly 
conformity  among  Christians;  and  that  is  to 
return  to  the  poverty,  the  equality,  and  purity 
of  early  Christianity.  There  is  only  one  way 
for  the  church  to  become  again  the  champion 
of  the  weak  and  dispossessed,  and  that  is  for 
Christians  to  surrender  their  privileges  in  the 
interests  of  industrial  equality  and  social 
brotherhood. 


24  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

Brothers,  it  is  said,  must  be  equal,  not 
only  in  nature,  but  in  opportunity,  not  only  in 
honor,  but  in  possessions.  It  is  a  practical 
denial  of  brotherhood  for  the  Christian  to 
possess  and  enjoy  when  his  social  brother  is 
in  want  and  suffering.  The  Christian  has  no 
right  to  superabundance  when  his  social 
brother  is  in  want. 

Personal  property  over  which  the  Christian 
claims  the  right  of  absolute  enjoyment  and 
control  is  a  violation  of  the  fundamental  idea 
of  Christian  brotherhood.  It  is  the  source  of 
the  social  inequalities  and  injustices  of  the 
present  shameful  condition  of  modern  society. 
While  it  obtains  in  the  church,  she  is  false  to  the 
spirit  of  her  Master  and  helpless  to  accomplish 
the  noble  work  of  social  redemption.  Such  are 
the  candid  and  extreme  views  of  many  who 
love  the  church  and  believe  in  Jesus  Christ  as 
the  savior  of  society. 

To  the  sympathetic  Christian  man,  moved 
by  the  spirit  of  Jesus,  there  is  a  marvellous 
fascination  in  the  thought  of  a  condition 
of  society  where  all  the  brethren  are  equal  in 
honor  and  opportunity  and  possessed  of  a 
common  measure  of  prosperity.  It  appeals 
alike  to  the  poetic  sentiments,  and  to  the 
pious  aspirations  of  the  Christian  heart. 
What  could  be  more  in  accordance  with  the 


THE   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE.  25 

divine  purpose,  it  would  seem,  than  the  re- 
moval of  all  financial  and  social  inequalities 
among  the  social  brotherhood?  What  more 
favorable  to  a  holy  life  than  the  removal  of  all 
temptations  of  the  spirit  by  the  suppression  of 
personal  ambitions  and  the  adoption  of  a 
happy  equality  in  the  material,  intellectual,  and 
moral  heritage  of  the  Kingdom  of  God? 

If,  however,  we  may  safely  judge  concern- 
ing God's  purpose  from  His  action,  it  is  man- 
ifestly certain  that  equality  either  in  gifts, 
graces,  or  material  possessions,  never  was  a 
part  of  his  plan,  in  bringing  in  the  Kingdom. 
If  we  are  to  learn  anything  from  Nature  as 
well  as  history  on  this  point,  then  the  one 
fact  of  life,  graven  deep  upon  the  rocks, 
painted  on  all  her  blossoms,  and  dyed  into  her 
noblest  life  blood,  is  the  existence  of  inequal- 
ity— inequality  of  faculties,  of  opportunity, 
and  of  character.  But  out  of  this  inequality 
springs  her  infinite  variety,  marvellous  richness, 
and  unfailing  resource.  And  Revelation  tells 
the  same  story — nowhere  common  powers  and 
possessions,  but  everywhere  inequality,  vari- 
ety, and  ceaseless  struggles  to  obtain  personal 
possessions  out  of  which  come  the  divinest 
fruits  of  the  spiritual  life. 

Much  as  the  Christian  idealist  could  wish 
to   see    realized  these    lofty  dreams   of  social 


26  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

equality  and  common  possessions  for  the  broth- 
erhood, the  stern  realities  of  our  mundane  life 
compel  our  thoughts  to  the  more  prosaic  facts 
about  bread  and  butter.  What  stands  in  the 
way  of  a  common  prosperity  is  not  the  un- 
willingness of  the  Christian  to  share  his  wealth 
and  surrender  his  privileges,  but  the  laws  of 
nature  which  govern  the  production  of  wealth 
and  the  laws  of  the  soul  which  create  per- 
sonal superiority. 

The  conditions  which  nature  has  exacted  as 
the  price  of  human  prosperity  are  stern,  diffi- 
cult, and  entirely  incompatible  with  ease,  in- 
competence, and  Utopian  dreams  of  equality. 
All  schemes,  therefore,  that  involve  restriction 
of  powers,  surrender  of  privileges,  limitations 
of  accumulated  wealth,  and  the  renunciation 
of  the  heritage  of  education  and  culture  on  the 
part  of  individual  Christians,  would  be  un- 
natural expedients,  doomed  to  disaster  by  the 
inexorable  laws  of  the  physical  and  mental  life 
under  which  we  exist. 

It  follows  that  even  if  it  could  be  shown 
that  the  limitation  of  accumulated  wealth 
and  surrender  of  social  privileges  on  the  part 
of  Christians  would  bring  back  the  pristine 
purity  and  noble  ideals  of  the  early  Chris- 
tian church,  the  inalienable  rights  of  Chris- 
tian  personality  would   still   have   to  be  con- 


THE   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE.  27 

sidered.  It  is  no  light  matter,  even  when 
considered  in  the  interests  of  social  redemp- 
tion, to  ask  the  Christian  to  surrender  the 
principle  of  private  property.  Christianity 
appealed  to  him  at  first  as  to  a  person.  His 
individual  nature,  with  all  his  varied  qualities 
of  head  and  heart,  all  his  heritage  of  race  and 
personal  experiences,  were  involved  in  the  fact 
of    his    soul's    surrender   to   Jesus  Christ. 

It  was  no  blunder  when  the  first  converts 
to  Christianity,  like  Paul,  laid  emphatic  stress 
upon  selfhood.  He  gave  a  ringing,  fearless, 
enunciation  of  the  doctrine  of  individuality. 
One  soul  was  worth  worlds. 

Christ  and  the  redeemed  individual  were 
made  to  stand  out,  related  to  each  other,  but 
in  splendid  isolation  from  all  the  rest  of  the 
world.  The  doctrine  was  fundamental.  It 
involved  all  the  characteristic  ideas  of  Chris- 
tianity concerning  the  personality  of  God  and 
of  the  regenerated  soul,  and  had  in  it  the 
promise  and  potency  of  a  regenerated  society. 

All  remedies  for  the  diseases  of  society 
must  sacredly  respect  this  doctrine  of  selfhood. 
The  Christian  man  owes  no  obligation  to  soci- 
ety which  would  violate  the  sacred  rights  of  his 
own  manhood.  Selfhood  is  the  grand  initia- 
tive in  morals  as  well  as  in  economics.  It  is  the 
creator  of  all  intellectual  and  spiritual,  as  well 


2S  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

as  all  material  wealth.  Christian  selfhood  is 
therefore  a  force  to  be  understood  and  con- 
trolled for  useful  ends,  not  vilified  and  de- 
stroyed. 

Amiel  says:  "Two  tendencies  of  our  epoch 
are  materialism  and  socialism — each  of  them 
ignoring  the  true  value  of  the  human  person- 
ality, and  drowning  it  in  the  totality  of  nature 
and  society."  Christianity  must  resist  both 
those  tendencies,  socialism  as  much  as  materi- 
alism ;  for  the  one  that  overwhelms  personality 
quenches  the  vital  spark  of  religion. 

It  may  be  candidly  admitted  that  Christian- 
ity has  over-emphasized  the  principle  of  self- 
hood, and  it  has  become  largely  egoism  in 
modern  church  life.  The  immense  strides 
made  by  the  present  generation  in  the  study 
of  social  conditions,  make  the  egoism  of  Chris- 
tians a  glaring  inconsistency,  a  spiritual  an- 
achronism hardly  to  be  tolerated  by  earnest 
souls.  But  we  must  not  tear  down  the  house 
because  the  thatch  needs  mending.  Before 
we  consent  to  the  social  and  spiritual  revolu- 
tion implied  in  Christian  socialism,  we  must 
hear  what  the  individual  Christian  has  to  say 
for  himself.  We  must  ask  what  the  doctrine  of 
individuality  has  done  for  the  man  and  society. 
For  it  may  be  found  that  the  hope  of  society 


THE   CHRISTIAN  DOCTRINE.  29 

even,  lies  in  a  redeemed,  enriched  individual- 
ity; and,  in  the  homely  language  of  the  nurs- 
ery, our  over-eager  reformers  may  be  in  dan- 
ger of  killing  the  goose  that  lays  the  golden 
eggs. 


III. 

SELFHOOD,  THE  CREATOR  OF  MATERIAL 
WEALTH. 

When  Christianity  comes  to  the  individual 
soul  it  brings  the  promise  of  an  abundant  life. 
The  Christian  writers  had  to  create  new  words 
to  express  the  new  ideas  of  their  gospel  of  per- 
sonal endowment.  The  language  of  paganism 
was  too  poor  to  furnish  expressions,  as  its  re- 
ligion and  philosophy  were  too  poor  to  furnish 
ideas  for  the  new  doctrine  of  a  redeemed  and  en- 
riched personality.  The  believer  in  Christ  was 
called  into  life,  grace,  virtue,  freedom,  honor, 
glory.  He  was  made  priest  and  king;  and  his 
submission  to  Christ  as  slave  in  the  new  King- 
dom only  emphasized  more  strikingly  his  free- 
dom from  all  servitude  of  body  or  mind  towards 
the  former  tyrants  of  altar  or  throne.  The 
pagan  mind  of  the  age  was  dazed  with  the  new 
ideas  of  personality.  He  himself  had  deified 
his  emperors,  but  this  new  faith  now  deified  his 
slaves.  The  common  attributes  of  the  Chris- 
tian man  gave  a  more  exalted  conception  of 
human  life  than  the  prerogative  of  kings. 
30 


CREATOR   OF  MATERIAL    WEALTH.      3 1 

Is  it  any  wonder  that  the  literature  of  primi- 
tive Christianity  contains  so  many  of  the 
boldest  and  most  masterful  expressions  of 
individualism?  Is  it  any  wonder  that  histor- 
ical Christianity  has  made  its  mark  in  the 
world  mainly  by  means  of  this  characteristic? 
Nay,  we  may  go  farther,  and  ask,  Is  it  any 
wonder  that  its  very  weaknesses  arise  from  the 
over-emphasis  of  this  splendid  feature  of  its 
life? 

No  one  who  has  any  knowledge  of  the 
early  history  of  the  Gospel,  will  deny  that  this 
doctrine  of  a  redeemed,  noble,  rich,  personal 
life,  was  the  re-creator  of  modern  European 
society.  Out  of  that  corrupt,  hopeless,  and 
powerless  pagan  world  a  new  life  sprang, 
armed  for  conquest,  with  a  strong  arm,  a  clear 
brain,  and  a  tender  heart.  It  was  seen,  not 
only  in  the  moral  purity  and  sweet  content- 
ment of  the  individual  life,  but  in  the  creative 
energies  which  affected  trade,  politics,  art, 
literature,  and  statesmanship. 

Although  Christian  Selfhood  took  many 
years  to  mould  society,  its  effects  upon 
the  individual  were  instant  and  decisive.  For 
all  individuals  called  out  of  the  pagan  life  by 
the  Gospel  the  results  were  the  same  as  on 
the  demoniac  healed  by  Jesus,  whose  friends 
saw  him  sitting  clothed  and  in  his  right  mind. 


32  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

This  new  life,  this  Christian  selfhood,  had 
its  natural  instincts,  and  the  laws  of  its  future 
growth  as  surely  implanted  by  its  divine  au- 
thor as  the  original  physical  and  mental  laws 
of  nature.  These  instincts  at  once  asserted 
themselves;  these  laws  went  instantly  into 
operation.  The  instinct  of  self-preservation 
is  not  more  imperative  on  all  living  things  than 
the  primal  command  of  the  Gospel,  "Grow  in 
grace,"  "Give  heed  to  thyself,"  "Hold  fast 
the  liberty  wherewith  Christ  hath  made  you 
free."  The  Christian's  first  duty  is  to  himself. 
It  includes  his  own  soul's  salvation,  growth, 
and  enrichment;  his  own  education,  the  devel- 
opment of  all  his  own  powers  of  head  and  heart, 
hand,  eye,  brain,  and  tongue. 

Whenever  the  early  Christian  looked  over 
the  record  of  God's  dealings  with  the  church 
in  the  Old  Testament,  he  saw  that  the  great 
and  wise  leaders  set  forth  for  his  admiration 
and  imitation  were  men  and  women  of  such 
large,  rich,  highly-endowed  lives.  Abraham, 
the  prince  and  wealthy  man  of  his  age ;  David, 
Isaiah,  Daniel,  Deborah,  Ruth,  Esther  were 
all  of  them  either  princes,  poets,  statesmen,  or 
people  of  wealth  and  consequence.  When  the 
doings  of  early  Christianity  took  form  in  a 
book,  the  Christian  of  the  Middle  Ages  saw,  and 
we  of  modern  times  see  the  same  general  fact 


CREATOR   OF  MATERIAL    WEALTH.      33 

only  slightly  modified  by  the  circumstances  of 
early  Gospel  times.  Paul  was  the  first  scholar 
of  his  time,  and  not  only  an  orator  but  a  highly 
endowed  personality.  If  Peter  and  John  were 
fishermen,  and,  in  contrast  to  the  academic 
education  of  Paul,  were  unlearned  and  ignor- 
ant men,  they  were  as  intelligent  as  the  average 
Greek  citizen  who  judged  poems  and  orations, 
and  voted  in  the  council  of  his  nation  though 
he  could  not  write  his  name.  Apollos  was  a 
learned  and  accomplished  rhetorician,  Luke 
was  a  physician,  and  Lydia  of  Thyatira  was  a 
rich  purple  merchant. 

Christians  very  soon  discovered  that  to  know 
the  traditions  of  their  faith  and  understand 
the  literature  of  their  sacred  books  was  a  lib- 
eral education  in  itself.  And  to  become  par- 
takers in  the  high  thoughts  and  noble  works 
of  its  great  missionaries  was  to  raise  one's 
self  to  eminence  in  the  leadership  of  the 
race.  A  doctrine  of  poverty  and  self-lim- 
itation to  such  a  faith  is  a  gross  absurdity  and 
contradiction  in  terms.  Expansion,  liberty, 
endowment,  physical,  mental,  and  spiritual, 
were  the  primal  instincts  of  the  new  faith,  and 
the  only  legitimate  outcome  of  its  new  laws  of 
life. 

As  its  doctrines  of  faith  and  repentance 
had  purified  the  heart  and  spirit  of  man,  so  its 


34  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

ideals  of  personal  excellence  inevitably  tend- 
ed to  adorn  and  enrich  every  phase  of  his 
physical  and  mental  life.  Christianity  has  the 
promise  of  the  life  that  now  is,  as  well  as  the 
life  to  come.  Such  a  statement  can  have  no 
meaning  unless  it  includes  the  discipline  and 
culture  of  all  our  powers  of  body  and  mind 
and  spirit,  and  carries  with  it  the  fruits  of  hon- 
est industry  and  enlightened  enterprise  as  a 
personal  possession.  Poverty  is  no  pet  doc- 
trine of  Christianity.  There  is  no  recorded 
beatitude  for  the  pauper.  Poverty  restricts 
the  natural  faculties  and  represses  the  aspira- 
tions of  the  Christian  spirit. 

The  social  ideal  of  Christianity  does  not  con- 
template a  condition  of  tame  mediocrity.  Of 
the  poor  the  poet  has  said 

Chill  penury  repressed  their  noble  rage 
And  froze  the  genial  current  of  the  soul. 

That  is  good  religion  as  well  as  good  poetry. 
The  res  angusta  domi,  the  harrow  of  poverty, 
has  gone  deep  into  many  a  soul.  It  sours 
without  humbling  the  spirit.  The  servile 
vices  of  slavery  are  not  more  contrary  to  the 
spirit  of  Christianity  than  the  vices  of  pauper- 
ism. 

Conformity  to  worldly  ideals,  desire  for  the 
larger  life,  its  pleasures  and  ambitions,  are 
not  by  any  means  absent  from  the  breast  of 


CREATOR   OF  MATERIAL    WEALTH.      35 

the  poor  man.  Indeed,  there  are  some  forms 
of  worldliness  that  are  more  deeply  intensified 
by  poverty  than  by  the  possession  of  wealth. 
The  bitterest  quarrels  over  wills  occur  most 
frequently  where  the  inheritance  is  small  and 
the  heirs  are  poor.  There  is,  on  the  contrary, 
a  certain  contempt  of  what  the  world  can  give, 
a  certain  lofty  scorn  of  its  pretensions,  possible 
only  to  the  man  who  has  always  lived  in  afflu- 
ence. 

The  error  in  Christian  history  which  made 
the  ascetic  and  anchorite  fashionable,  which 
drove  half  the  church  into  monasteries  and 
convents,  would  be  repeated  in  essence  in 
our  own  day  should  we  restrict  the  possession 
of  wealth  in  an  attempt  to  clarify  the  spirit  of 
worldliness.  The  outcome  of  the  previous  ef- 
forts was  greater  luxury,  pride,  and  conformity 
than  the  world  has  ever  seen.  To-day  the  richest 
community  on  earth  is  one  whose  fundamental 
vow  is  poverty.  We  cannot  control  the  re- 
sistless energies  of  the  human  spirit  by  an 
external  rule  so  rude  as  the  restriction  of  its 
material  possessions. 

Christianity  during  the  ages  may  have  made 
many  mistakes  in  the  use  of  those  individual 
powers,  so  brought  into  exercise,  in  its  asser- 
tion of  social  privileges  and  its  expenditure 
of  wealth,  but   they   cannot  be  corrected  by 


36  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

schemes  of  socialism  and  confiscation,  which 
contradict  and  belie  the  essential  promises  and 
hopes  of  the  Gospel. 

No  page  of  human  history  is  more  splendidly 
beneficent  than  that  which  records  the  story 
of  Christianity's  redemption  and  enrichment 
of  individual  lives;  and  the  eye  must  be  blind 
indeed  which  fails  to  see  that  material  pros- 
perity, freedom,  and  culture  of  the  individual; 
the  home,  and  society  itself  come  in  the  train 
of  this  spiritual  regeneration  of  the  individual 
soul. 

But  the  full  force  of  this  principle  of  in- 
dividual enrichment  cannot  be  fully  felt  until 
we  examine  its  effects  upon  family  life.  The 
family  is  in  reality,  a  part  of  the  individual. 
His  truest,  noblest  individuality  grows  out  of 
and  returns  into  the  family.  It  is  the  true  in- 
teger and  norm  of  society;  and  when  the 
Christian  religion  touches  a  man's  life,  its 
deepest  and  most  lasting  benefits  reach  quickly 
down  into  the  secret  springs  of  family  life. 

Personally  the  believer  becomes  intelligent, 
industrious,  and  ambitious  of  attaining  all  intel- 
lectual and  social  advantages  which  the  new 
life  offers  him.  Physically,  as  well  as  morally, 
he  is  a  new  creature.  His  environment,  as 
well  as  his  heart,  is  changed. 

He  now  becomes  an  important  factor  in  the 


CREATOR   OF  MATERIAL    WEALTH.      37 

production  of  wealth ;  most  likely  a  more  skilled 
workman,  certainly  a  more  reliable  and  con- 
scientious one.  He  is  more  careful  of  his 
material  possessions,  more  thrifty,  while  at  the 
same  time  he  consumes,  for  his  own  proper 
purposes,  more  and  better  articles  of  food  and 
clothing. 

He  is  also  an  important  consideration  in 
the  element  of  supply  and  demand  affecting  the 
markets  of  the  world.  His  very  ideals  at  once 
tend  to  clothe  themselves  in  concrete  facts. 
They  have  created  new  wants,  so  that  the  re- 
generative forces  of  Christianity  in  one  genera- 
tion tell  upon  the  wealth  of  the  world  and  the 
current  prices  of  the  market. 

Nay,  they  reach  further — even  affecting  the 
plans  and  ambitions  of  his  life.  His  new  no- 
tions of  life  are  seen,  not  only  at  his  table  and 
his  recreations,  but  in  his  thinking  and  educa- 
tion. 

Yet,  great  as  these  effects  are,  they  become 
insignificant  compared  with  the  vital  changes 
which  affect  his  family.  In  the  individual 
there  may  be  instances  in  which  these  changes 
are  but  slightly  apparent.  In  the  families  of  a 
generation   or  two  they  produce  a  revolution. 

In  relation  to  the  future  career  of  his  children 
the  Christian  man  is  not  only  a  new  creature, 
but  a  new    social    force.     Socially  he  is   the 


38  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

creator  of  Christian  states,  and  of  modern  civi- 
lized society. 

It  is  much  for  Christianity  to  have  been  the 
conqueror  of  the  leading  intellects  of  ancient 
and  modern  Europe  and  America,  but  that 
circumstance  is  as  the  small  dust  of  the  bal- 
ance compared  with  the  power  she  wields  as 
the  founder  of  Christian  homes  and  the  direc- 
tor of  Christian  education. 

It  is  the  first,  as  it  is  the  grandest  instinct  of 
the  new-born  soul  of  the  parent  to  seek  the 
welfare  of  the  child.  The  salvation  of  the 
family  and  the  consecration  of  the  principle  of 
heredity  are  indeed,  as  proved  by  Christian  his- 
tory, as  potent  factors  in  the  spread  of  Chris- 
tian civilization,  as  the  conversion  of  individ- 
ual souls.  They  are,  in  the  Christian  temple 
of  life,  the  lamp  whose  flame  is  never  allowed 
to  die  out.  They  are,  in  Christian  society, 
not  sporadic  changeable  influences  for  good, 
but  the  great  elemental  moral  forces,  slow, 
perhaps,  but  resistless  as  a  glacier — primal  also 
and  magnificent. 

We  thus  see  that  Christianity  introduces  us 
to  experiences  of  life  which  reach  back  of  in- 
dividual opinions,  and  local  customs,  and  the 
more  personal  and  accidental  features  of  life, 
and  touches  natural  and  primal  springs  in  the 
human  soul. 


CREATOR   OF  MATERIAL    WEALTH.      39 

Christianity,  from  this  point  of  view,  is  not 
merely  personal  belief  nor  a  conventional  rite, 
nor  in  any  sense  a  something  superadded  to 
human  nature.  It  is  an  appeal  to,  and  a 
reinforcement  of  human  nature.  It  is  an 
inspirer  of  natural  faculties,  and  can  play 
its  part  most  truly  when  the  deep  springs 
of  the  human  soul  are  opened.  It  may 
be,  just  because  of  this  truth,  and  as  a  con- 
dition of  its  action  as  a  natural  force  work- 
ing in  the  sphere  of  natural  law,  that  Chris- 
tianity also  is  subject  to  the  universal  laws  of 
growth  and  decay  which  govern  all  things 
that  live. 

Everything  organic  and  inorganic  has  its 
enemies.  Life  itself  is  but  a  cycle  of  growth 
and  decay  out  of  which  in  turn  new  elements 
of  life  are  formed.  The  spiritual  life  of  the  soul 
is  no  exception  to  this  law. 

Christianity  indeed,  is  itself  the  creator  of 
virtues  which,  in  their  turn,  produce  wealth  and 
culture  and  social  ambition  dangerous  to  the 
purity  of  the  faith  and  the  loftiest  spiritual 
ideals.  The  fruit  of  faith  is  virtue,  and  virtue 
has  a  financial  value. 

Christianity  is  therefore  a  creator  of  wealth ; 
but  wealth,  it  is  said,  or  at  least  its  possession  by 
the  individual  Christian,  is  the  root  of  all  social 
evil.     Is  then  the  spiritual  life  of  the  soul  in- 


40  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

volved  in  the  fatal  cycle  of  universal  nature? 
Must  it  grow  but  to  decay? 

Do  the  forces  that  regenerate  the  individual 
work  moral  decay  and  industrial  confusion?  as 
faith  produces  virtue,  virtue  creates  wealth, 
wealth  fosters  worldly  ideals,  and  so  the  spirit 
of  religion  is  poisoned  by  the  noxious  weeds 
which  Christianity  itself  has  produced.  Chris- 
tian ideals  of  manhood  result  in  new  ambi- 
tions for  family  advancement.  This  is  but 
another  name  for  worldly  conformity,  and  so 
the  power  that  ennobles  society  becomes  the 
power  to  destroy  it. 

How  is  this  to  be  explained,  not  to  say 
remedied?  Is  this  then  a  contradiction?  Or 
is  Christianity  an  evil  in  its  turn?  Is  it  merely 
another  of  the  forces  of  nature  making  music 
in  the  spirit  to-day  to  end  at  last  in  a  wail  of 
despair?  Is  all  effort  for  betterment  doomed, 
and  do  our  weary  feet  tread  the  cycle  of 
growth  and  decay,  to  end  at  last  in  degenera- 
tion and  perhaps  death? 

Instead  of  such  disasters,  we  claim  that 
this  feature  of  Christianity  gives  it  a  place 
amid  the  facts  of  life — it  is  part  of  nature.  It 
has  its  feet  on  the  firm  earth  of  reality.  It 
denies  no  fact  of  nature  and  human  life,  other- 
wise proved  by  the  senses  and  intellect  of  man. 

Christianity  is,  above  all  things,  a  sane  and 


CREATOR  OF  MATERIAL   GROWTH.      41 

rational  religion.  If  its  head  is  crowned  with 
the  stars  its  feet  are  on  the  common  high- 
ways of  man.  It  does  not  propose  to  evade 
the  difficulties  that  pertain  to  it,  as  a  part 
of  nature,  by  an  appeal  to  its  spiritual  feat- 
ures. If,  as  a  material  force,  it  creates  wealth 
and  ambitions,  which  in  their  turn  tempt  the 
soul,  it  is  ready  to  show  in  what  natural 
ways  that  same  wealth  and  ambition  may  also 
minister  to  the  soul's  high  aim. 

This  ministry  is  by  natural  means,  though  it 
is  claimed  that  in  the  process  there  is  divine 
and  spiritual  reinforcement  of  the  soul. 

The  intelligent  Christian  sees,  therefore,  in 
this  struggle  not  a  hopeless  conflict  of  natural 
forces,  but  a  phase  of  soul  contest  towards  the 
purest  and  highest  life.  It  is  but  the  modern 
expression  of  this  Apostolic  principle:  ''There 
is  a  law  in  my  members  warring  against  the  law 
of  the  spirit." 

To-day  it  is  being  applied  to  the  accumula- 
tion and  use  of  wealth  as  never  before  in  the 
history  of  the  church  of  Christ.  We  have  more 
light  because  we  have  more  experience.  We 
not  only  know  better  what  is  meant  by  the 
"world"  and  what  by  the  "church,"  but 
we  know  better  what  money  can  and  what 
it  cannot  do. 

We  have  nothing  to  gain  from  exaggeration 


42  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

and  less  still  from  mere  generalities.  We  must 
endeavor  to  see  life  under  normal  conditions. 
We  must  look  into  the  Christian  man's  home 
and  into  his  heart.  We  must  treat  him  as 
a  brother,  and  judge  him  at  his  best. 

For  the  very  forces  under  which  he  is  acting, 
both  in  business  and  society,  are  gener- 
ated and  blessed  by  the  Christian  faith,  and 
are  to  be  better  understood  and  more  wisely 
controlled  in  the  interests  of  a  nobler  social 
order. 


IV. 

SELFHOOD  AND  THE   INTELLECTUAL 
PROGRESS  OF   SOCIETY. 

We  have  considered  the  doctrine  of  Chris- 
tian selfhood  hitherto  exclusively  from  the 
bearing  it  has  upon  the  individual  and  the 
family.  We  have  seen  that  salvation  includes 
the  development  of  individual  qualities  of 
mind  and  heart,  which  are  the  inalienable  priv- 
ileges of  the  new  life.  The  vision  of  such  a 
redeemed  life  has  no  horizon;  eternity  sweeps 
around  it,  and  the  heritage  of  the  past  clasps 
hands  with  the  promise  of  the  future  in  a 
divine  ministry  to  its  measureless  progress. 

We  have  seen  that  this  faith  holds  the 
virtues  and  energies  of  the  family;  it  claims 
an  interest  in  and  dominion  over  heredity  and 
race;  it  regards  the  individual  as  completed 
only  in  the  family.  The  promise  is  to  the 
believer  and  his  children.  It  lays  hold  upon 
the  persistent  sleepless  forces  of  education  and 
culture.  It  exalts  to  a  sacred  cultus  the  in- 
stinct of  parenthood,  which  longs  to  see  the 
child  more  wise,  more  strong,  more  honored 
43 


44  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

than  the  parent.  Accordingly  the  Christian 
owes  it  to  himself  and  the  highest  ends  of  his 
own  selfhood  to  use  all  his  powers  for  the  ad- 
vancement of  his  individual  and  family  life 
along  every  avenue  of  moral,  intellectual,  and 
social  progress. 

But  the  case  of  Christian  selfhood  does 
not  rest  here ;  it  is  vitally  related  to  the  fate 
of  society.  We  candidly  acknowledge  that 
society  has  imperative  claims  upon  the  indi- 
vidual. Our  great  anxiety  is  to  discover  how 
best  those  claims  can  be  met.  Will  it  be  by 
impoverishing  self  and  limiting  personal  pos- 
sessions; by  a  doctrine  of  restriction  or  of  en- 
largement? The  Christian  might  well  yield 
his  fancied  liberty  and  share  his  possessions 
and  surrender  his  privileges  for  an  end  so  noble 
as  a  regenerated  and  enriched  social  order. 
But  the  awful  doubt  that  the  sacrifice  would 
be  in  vain,  casts  its  shadow  over  his  hopes. 

In  his  eagerness  to  improve  the  social  condi- 
tions of  the  poor,  the  oppressed,  and  the  dis- 
possessed classes,  the  doctrine  of  self-sacrifice, 
self-renunciation,  and  poverty  is  preached  by 
the  reformer  with  painful  obliviousness  to  the 
facts  of  history. 

Is  it  not  a  return  to  the  old  doctrine  of  ascet- 
icism, that  virtue  consists  in  denial  and  self- 
limitation.    As  Amiel  asks,  "  Does  duty  consist 


INTELLECTUAL  PROGRESS.  45 

in  obeying  one's  nature,  even  the  best  and 
most  spiritual,  or  in  conquering  it?"  This 
revival  of  an  exploded  heresy  is  for  conquer- 
ing nature  not  obeying  it. 

On  the  surface  of  it,  there  is  much  plausi- 
bility in  this  dogma  of  self-repression. 

It  looks  so  pious  also.  But  the  wiser  sec- 
ond thought  of  modern  life  will  show  us  that 
duty  to  one's  self,  to  God,  and  even  to  soci- 
ety demands  obedience  to  the  new  nature  be- 
gotten in  the  Christian  by  the  Holy  Spirit. 
To  ignore  this  doctrine  of  Christian  selfhood 
is  really  fatal  to  any  improvement  of  society 
and  to  the  progress  of  civilization. 

We  believe  the  first  duty  of  the  Christian  is 
to  himself.  His  own  spirit,  his  own  business, 
his  own  family  demand,  by  imperious  injunc- 
tions of  scripture  and  nature,  obedience  to  the 
first  law  of  all  life,  self-preservation,  and  self- 
development.  His  first  duty  is  to  grow  in 
grace,  in  knowledge  of  life,  in  experience  of 
heart  and  head.  He  can  by  no  process  of 
denial,  limitation,  or  self-sacrifice  do  as  much 
for  the  Kingdom  of  Christ  as  to  prove,  that 
by  faith  he  has  earned  and  entered  on  the 
possession  of  a  large  inheritance  of  selfhood. 
God's  great  possessions  are  rich,  strong,  full- 
orbed  souls. 

His   greatest   glory  is  in  the   development, 


46  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

under  the  leading  of  His  Spirit,  of  such  souls 
in  all  ages.  His  church  has  always  been  rich, 
and  the  world  always  blessed  in  proportion  as 
such  souls  have  appeared  in  all  times  and 
places.  Christ  came  to  give  us  life — and  that 
life  abundantly.  The  inheritance  of  the  Chris- 
tian is  unsearchable  riches.  Religion  is  not  a 
state  of  either  spiritual,  mental,  or  material 
poverty.  The  God  who  endowed  such  large 
natures  as  Abraham,  Moses,  Paul,  Milton, 
Pascal,  and  Gladstone  intended  vast  personal 
enrichment  of  the  mind  and  spirit  for  all  his 
sons  and  daughters. 

But  a  restriction  or  surrender  of  the  physical 
conditions  of  life,  out  of  which  grow  for  any 
community  culture,  education,  and  the  "am- 
ple page  of  knowledge  rich  with  the  spoils 
of  time,"  is  as  surely  a  denial  to  souls  un- 
born of  this  ample  individual  life  as  if  we 
were  to  close  our  colleges,  libraries,  and  mus- 
eums in  obedience  to  the  dictates  of  an  obscur- 
antist sect.  We  can  not  afford  to  neglect  the 
meaning  of  richly  endowed  and  developed  per- 
sonalities. 

A  great  man  is  God's  greatest  gift  to  the 
world.  Greatness  is  but  another  name  for  a 
rich  and  varied  nature ;  achievement  is  but  an- 
other phase  of  personal  development.  The 
imperishable   treasures  of   civilization  are  the 


INTELLECTUAL   PROGRESS.  47 

blossoming  and  fruitage  of  great  minds  and 
wills.  There  is  a  divine  disregard  of  the  fruits 
of  the  mediocre  life.  There  is  a  divine  care 
for  the  thoughts  and  deeds  of  transcendent 
spirits. 

The  names  which  have  moulded  the  thoughts 
and  actions  of  the  race  are  numbered  almost 
on  the  fingers  of  the  hands.  Aristotle,  Bacon, 
Abraham,  Paul,  Jesus,  Calvin,  Angelo,  Ra- 
phael, Newton,  Darwin,  Shakespeare,  Luther, 
Goethe,  Washington — we  might  easily  give  up 
all  the  others  if  we  are  allowed  to  retain  these. 
Selfhood  in  its  noblest  sense  was  the  first  great 
concern  with  all  these  minds  and  in  all  these 
souls.  Whether  in  the  path  of  duty,  or  the 
creation  of  works  of  the  imagination,  or  the 
leadership  of  nations,  personal  responsibility  to 
the  ideal  life — the  best — is  the  characteristic 
and  dominant  force  of  the  great  spirits  who 
have  made  life  worth  living  for  us  plain 
people. 

It  is  not  the  creative  force  of  a  vague  com- 
munal sympathy  which  writes  The  Iliad,  or 
paints  the  Sistine  Madonna,  or  rears  the  Par- 
thenon. Shakespeare  did  not  create  his  im- 
mortal characters,  nor  did  Paul  write  his  epis- 
tles because  of  a  high  level  of  the  altruistic 
spirit,  and  a  general  prevalence  of  good  wages 
in  the  nation.   The  artist,  poet,  and  orator,  are 


48  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

often  self-centered,  intent  on  large  personal 
experiences;  they  are  not,  professedly,  phil- 
anthropists. The  masses  and  their  interests, 
the  social  conditions  are  not  greatly  in  evi- 
dence with  them  when  intent  upon  their  pro- 
ducts of  the  imagination.  But  where  would 
the  priceless  heritage  of  beauty,  exalted 
thought,  inspiration  in  the  common  round  of 
life,  exist  to-day,  had  not  these  spirits  apart 
poured  forth  the  rich  treasures  of  their  indi- 
viduality? 

The  modern  individual  is  in  danger  of  be- 
ing lost,  not  only  in  commerce  and  trusts  and 
corporations,  but  among  mission  boards  and 
societies  for  philanthropy.  Yet  all  the  hope 
of  the  salvation  of  the  world  lies  in  the  divine 
forces  entrusted  by  God  to  the  souls  of  great 
and  good  men  and  women.  Personality  is 
the  richest  and  most  ultimate  elemental  force  in 
nature,  as  well  as  in  the  spiritual  life.  With- 
out that  "everlasting  aye"  of  the  individual 
spirit, — the  experience  of  God  in  the  soul  we 
call  conversion, — where  were  the  hope  to-day 
of  any  betterment  of  human  society?  Is  there 
any  betterment  possible  that  cannot  at  last  be 
traced  to,  and  analysed  into,  an  individual  ex- 
perience? 

What  was  Paul,  with  that  mighty  evan- 
gelistic energy   which   flowed  out   of  his  life, 


INTELLECTUAL   PROGRESS.  49 

but  a  great  and  overmastering  individuality 
worked  upon  by  the  new  Spirit  of  Christ. 
"I  can  do  all  things."  ''I  am  crucified  with 
Christ."  "I  live;  yet  not  I,  but  Christ  liveth 
in  me."  Never  were  such  sublime  egoisms 
in  all  history.  This  man  was  first  rich,  strong, 
masterful  in  possession,  and  had  command  of 
all  the  resources  of  the  mind  and  spirit,  before 
he  could  pour  out  his  treasures  at  the  feet  of 
his  Master  for  the   regeneration  of  his  fellows. 

Every  one  possessing  the  spirit  of  those 
great  workers,  saints,  and  confessors  of  the 
church,  feels  this  divine  impulse  for  personal 
growth  and  development  of  powers,  that  he 
may  have  something  to  give  to  his  Savior.  It  is 
an  instinct ;  it  is  an  impulse  to  all  high  action 
and  heroism  of  mastery  over  personal  sloth  and 
ignorance.  Who  can  dictate  to  the  soul  who 
first  learns  Christ  what  shall  be  the  measure  of 
its  development?  Who  shall  say  whether  this 
Giotto  of  the  Christian  life  shall  continue  to 
tend  sheep  upon  the  mountain  side,  or  go  to 
drink  the  learning  of  the  ages  at  the  feet  of  the 
great  masters? 

But  education  means  wealth,  therefore  to 
limit  wealth  means  to  limit  culture.  Who  will 
measure  the  disaster  to  Christian  truth  and 
work,  if  the  bright  spirits  of  those  obscure 
youths,    from    Luther,    the    miner's    son,    to 


50  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

Neesima,  the  Japanese  outcast,  had  been  de- 
nied the  fruits  of  wealth  in  the  great  universi- 
ties of  their  time? 

I  cannot  limit  for  myself,  much  less  for  my 
child,  the  financial  requirements  of  my  age  and 
profession.  Twenty-five  years  ago  a  youth 
might  fully  equip  himself  for  professional  ser- 
vice on  half  of  what  the  post-graduate  and 
European  course  of  higher  instruction  demand 
to-day.  It  may  be  the  best  service  I  can  ren- 
der to  the  cause  of  the  kingdom  to  equip  fully 
and  train  at  vast  cost  of  time  and  money  such 
a  personality. 

In  the  early  days  of  our  religious  experience 
we  feel  the  fire  of  a  great  love  and  we  dis- 
count the  acquisitions  of  the  mind.  We  are 
ready  to  deny  and  limit  and  restrain  ourselves. 
At  such  an  hour  the  "  self-denying  ordinance  " 
of  a  peculiar  community  might  appear  to  be  no 
loss.  But  as  the  years  go  by,  and  forces 
which  make  for  human  enlightenment  and  the 
betterment  of  society  become  better  known, 
we  realize  that  no  power  goes  so  deep  or  lasts 
so  long  as  a  great  and  richly  endowed  person- 
ality. 

This  is  the  age  of  authority.  Not  merely  a 
truth  in  the  abstract,  but  the  personality  of 
him  who  says  it.  A  word  from  Frances  E. 
Willard,  Lord  Kelvin,  Clara  Barton,  or  W.  E. 


INTELLECTUAL   PROGRESS.  51 

Gladstone  on  their  various  subjects  is  listened 
to  by  a  whole  world.  If  any  great  task  is  to 
be  undertaken  it  can  be  successfully  carried  out 
only  by  some  strong  personality.  This  is  the 
principle  always  recognized  in  sending  ambassa- 
dors ;  now  all  service  of  state  or  church  recog- 
nizes the  same  fact. 

Both  the  Christian  church  and  civic  state 
need  to-day,  as  never  before  in  this  realm  of 
social  activity,  the  service  of  great,  strong, 
richly-endowed  personalities.  But  the  volun- 
tary limitation  of  wealth  recognizes  the  very 
opposite  principle.  Logically  it  means  that 
suppression  of  natural  gifts,  not  the  develop- 
ment of  those  gifts,  is  the  duty  of  the  Christian 
man.  It  is  laying  violent  hands  upon  powers 
not  our  own:  for  ye  are  not  your  own,  "ye 
are  bought  with  a  price." 

Who  can  measure  the  extent  and  quality  of 
natural  gifts  in  any  youth  till  tested  by  educa- 
tion? But  no  system  of  training,  either  in  home 
or  in  university,  could  be  built  upon  a  basis  of 
doing  as  little  as  possible  for  one's  self.  It  would 
prove  but  a  "Procrustes  bed"  for  the  long- 
limbed  genius  as  least,  and  a  very  fiery  oven 
for  burning  up  the  aspirations  of  all  the  excep- 
tionally gifted  natures.  The  gifted  souls,  who 
regard  material  conditions  but  as  accidents 
of  life,  the    regal   choice    and    buoyant  ones, 


52  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

would  see  this  brazen  dome  over  their  heads 
instead  of  the  sky.  They  would  be  forced  to 
live  in  a  community  where  a  narrow  horizon 
was  regarded  as  better  than  the  wide  open 
vault  of  heaven,  and  where  more  reliance  was 
placed  on  artificial  restraints  than  upon  the 
free  ordering  of  a  redeemed  and  consecrated 
life. 


V. 


SELFHOOD  THE   AGENT  OF   SOCIAL 
BETTERMENT. 

' '  The  destruction  of  the  poor  is  his  poverty. ' ' 
These  words  of  the  inspired  wise  man  graph- 
ically describe  the  sad  condition  of  the  sub- 
merged classes.  The  real  trouble  with  the 
great  mass  which  we  want  to  help  is  their  ma- 
terial, intellectual,  and  moral  poverty.  They 
are  as  a  class  weak,  ignorant,  defective,  unfor- 
tunate, and  disinherited. 

No  single  word  can  fully  describe  the  hard, 
cruel  lot  of  the  socially  degraded  inhabitants  of 
a  London  or  a  New  York  or  a  Chicago.  From 
the  respectable  and  skillful  laborer,  who 
complains  that  his  opportunities  are  unequal, 
his  work  uncertain,  and  his  wages  inadequate, 
to  the  defective  and  diseased  and  incapable 
sufferers  from  social  injustice  and  industrial 
evils,  there  are  all  classes  and  conditions  of 
people  who  need  help  and  justice  in  the  re-ar- 
rangement of  the  social  order.  All  who  have 
fallen,  whether  by  their  own  vices  or  misfor- 
tunes, or  by  the  injustice  of  others,  are  equally 
53 


54  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

in  need.  All  who  are  born  defective  and  im- 
properly equipped  for  the  battle  of  life;  and 
all  who  have  gone  down  beneath  the  fierce 
blows  of  an  inhuman  contest  for  their  daily 
bread  go  to  make  up  the  melancholy  com- 
pany. 

We  ought  not,  in  justice  to  ourselves,  to  al- 
low the  anarchistic  rant  of  professional  agita- 
tors, nor  the  crude  economic  heresies  of  some 
labor  leaders,  to  prejudice  us  in  considering 
the  needs  of  the  socially  unfortunate  and  in- 
dustrially oppressed.  They  exist,  and  what- 
ever folly  has  been  spoken  in  their  cause  they 
must  be  helped,  for  they  threaten  the  very  ex- 
istence of  our  civilization. 

We  may  admit  that  no  single  institution, 
or  set  of  forces,  no  particular  laws  may  be 
to  blame  for  the  present  deplorable  condi- 
tion of  a  large  part  of  society.  But  surely 
this  condition  itself  is  a  fact  of  vital  import- 
ance to  all  who  love  Christ  and  honor  His 
church,  and  are  loyal  to  the  noble  heritage 
of  liberty  and  right  received  from  the  fathers. 
In  the  midst  of  the  most  splendid  achieve- 
ments of  modern  science  and  industry,  thou- 
sands of  thousands  of  our  fellow-countrymen 
have  no  personal  share  in  the  fruits  of  this 
harvest.  In  this  age  of  invention  thousands  of 
thousands,  and   many   of  these  weak  women 


SOCIAL   BETTERMENT.  55 

and  helpless  children,  are  the  slaves  of  a  hope- 
less industrial  bondage. 

But  the  young,  young  children,  O  my  brothers, 

They  are  weeping  bitterly, 
In  the  playtime  of  the  others, 

In  the  country  of  the  free. 

When  the  most  brilliant  pageant  of  modern 
history  passed  through  the  streets  of  a  great 
European  capital ;  when  the  rank  and  intellect 
and  wealth  and  culture  of  one  of  the  mightiest 
nations  on  earth,  celebrated  the  jubilee  of  the 
most  magnificent  reign  the  world  has  ever  seen, 
it  was  yet  needful  to  spread  a  pauper's  table, 
and  feed  with  the  bread  of  charity  countless 
thousands  of  the  citizens  of  that  same  rich 
nation.  Thus  all  that  these  submerged  classes 
had  of  the  fruits  of  this  splendid  era  of  liberty, 
wealth,  and  art,  was  a  dole  of  charity.  ' '  Blessed 
is  he  that  considereth  the  poor";  and  the 
blessing  of  God  certainly  rests  upon  the  sweet 
womanly  heart  who,  amid  the  luxury  and 
splendor  of  the  hour,  considered  London's 
poor. 

But  the  social  wounds  of  the  day  cannot 
be  healed  by  charity,  nor  can  the  deep  dis- 
content, and  real  and  fancied  wrongs  of  the 
oppressed  and  weak  and  outcast  classes  be 
righted  by  private  kindness  and  munificence. 
We  must  approach  these  men  and  women  as 


56  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

brothers  and  sisters  of  a  common  lot.  We  must 
look  into  their  case  as  fellow-citizens  of  a  com- 
mon country  and  partakers  of  a  common  hope. 

One  fact  stands  out  conspicuously  in  the  lurid 
landscape  of  social  degradation.  It  is  their 
common  poverty.  From  circumference  to 
centre  of  this  world  of  woe,  they  all  want 
something.  It  is  all  poverty — poverty  of  faith, 
of  will,  of  resource,  of  physical  qualities,  of 
intellectual  qualities,  of  moral  qualities. 
Money  is  the  smallest  part  of  their  needs. 
This  want  represents  the  general  trouble,  but 
their  real  wants  lie  deeper.  What  do  they 
possess?  Misfortune,  injustice,  sickness,  and 
all  but  endless  toil.  They  are  the  great  disin- 
herited. 

If  you  would  lay  your  hand  to  the  work  of 
help,  you  will  find  readily  the  truth  of  this 
statement.  Go  among  them  to  help  in  the 
task  of  their  betterment  and  you  must  be  the 
possessor  of  something.  You  must  be  a 
scholar,  or  a  physician,  or  a  lawyer,  or  a  nurse, 
or  a  teacher,  or  a  capitalist,  or  an  artist,  or  at 
least  a  gentleman.  They  do  not  need  your 
poverty  or  ignorance  or  incapacity :  they  have 
more  than  they  need  of  that.  In  whatever 
department  of  human  activity  you  would  ren- 
der assistance  you  must  yourself  be  a  rich  and 
strong  personality;  you,   yourself,   must  be  a 


SOCIAL   BETTERMENT.  57 

possessor  of  something  before  you  can  help 
enrich  them. 

The  vaunted  doctrine  of  restriction  and 
surrender  of  self-denial  and  poverty  would  be  a 
disaster  here.  What  these  people  need  are 
educated,  rich,  strong,  self-controlled,  and  cul- 
tured Christian  men  and  women.  In  a  word 
they  need  capital,  the  fruits  of  accumulated 
wealth.  The  qualities  and  possessions  which 
the  short-sighted  critic  of  the  present  order 
objects  to  in  the  Christian  are  the  only  reme- 
dies with  which  social  want  and  sorrow  can  be 
cured. 

Although  it  has  been  asserted,  with  consid- 
erable appearance  of  truth,  that  the  Christians 
of  to-day  are  rich,  privileged,  and  educated 
out  of  all  sympathy  with  the  sorrows  and 
wrongs  of  the  poor  and  oppressed,  it  certainly 
cannot  be  said  with  any  degree  of  truth  that 
the  haunts  of  poverty,  vice,  and  destitution 
are  colonies  of  Christians.  The  Christian 
seems  to  possess  a  magic  power  of  social  eleva- 
tion. You  cannot  keep  him  down.  He  is 
master  of  social  forces.  He  solves  for  himself 
the  social  problem.  Is  it  not  a  wonder  that 
the  social  reformer  has  not  enquired  into  the 
secret  of  this  social  buoyancy?  Is  it  not  be- 
cause of  this  doctrine  of  a  strong,  rich,  self- 
hood?    If  this  doctrine   is   denied,  or  injured 


5$  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

by  any  false  teaching  concerning  the  right  of 
personal  property,  or  education  and  enlarge- 
ment of  the  individual  life,  will  not  the  very 
conditions  of  a  regenerated  society,  material 
betterment,  and  the  progress  of  civilization  be 
destroyed  ? 

Now  within  the  family  of  the  socially  de- 
graded there  is  often  found  marked  incapacity, 
congenital  weakness,  absence  of  will-power, 
and  entire  want  of  education  for  the  real  busi- 
ness of  life.  Heredity  which  should  be  an 
accession  of  physical  energy,  skill,  and  moral 
resource,  is  too  often  a  deadly  curse  of  disease 
and  mental  infirmity.  But  in  a  Christian 
home  these  characteristics  are  all  reversed. 
Here  Christianity  has  raised  for  herself  a  fort 
in  the  presence  of  the  destructive  forces  of  life, 
and  armed  and  equipped  every  life  for  stern 
battle.  On  the  material  side  of  life  we  find 
industry,  thrift,  enterprise,  and  character. 
The  farm  yields  plenty,  the  loom  sings  the  song 
of  abundance,  the  forge  sends  forth  the  fire  of 
hope,  and  commerce  spreads  her  white  wings 
over  the  sea  at  the  bidding  of  forces  born  and 
fostered  in  those  active  educated  Christian  in- 
tellects. 

The  wealth-producing  forces  in  the  bosom 
of  that  Christian  family  are  as  inevitable  and 
resistless  as  growth  and  gravitation.      Even  in 


SOCIAL  BETTERMENT.  59 

point  of  comparison  as  wealth  producers,  chil- 
dren so  endowed  and  reared  beat  the  world  on 
its  own  chosen  ground.  Their  faith  and  love 
have  actually  gone  into  the  bone  and  tissue  of 
their  bodies.  They  have  clear  heads,  steady 
nerves,  powers  of  endurance,  and  economy  of 
living  that  carry  them  far  ahead  of  all  competi- 
tors, weighted  as  these  often  are  by  hereditary 
taints,  loose  living,  and  extravagant  expendi- 
ture. 

But  when  we  add  to  these  qualities,  the 
ideals  of  life,  the  moral  and  spiritual  discipline 
which  they  have  been  subjected  to,  we  then 
can  form  some  idea  of  the  ceaseless  upward 
pressure  into  the  regions  of  literature,  art, 
music,  and  fine  manners,  which  is  continually 
acting  on  those  communities,  which  are  influ- 
enced by  the  forces  of  Christianity.  Their 
own  virtues  will  not  let  them  stand  still. 

As  the  fruit  of  this  industry  and  enter- 
prise is  reaped  by  the  family,  the  scale  of  ex- 
penditure inevitably  increases.  In  dress,  in 
furniture,  in  service,  and  finally  in  residence 
and  equipage,  the  gradual  rise  of  the  family 
fortune  is  manifested.  Now  all  those  virtues, 
all  those  qualities  of  brain  and  heart,  are  pre- 
cisely what  is  needed  for  the  redemption  of  so- 
ciety. 

Nothing   so   characterized  the  condition   of 


60  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

East  London  when  the  social  workers  first  went 
to  carry  the  promise  of  a  better  life  to  it,  as 
the  entire  absence  of  beauty  and  pleasure.  In 
the  vast  aggregation  of  nearly  two  million 
souls  there  was  no  picture  gallery,  no  library, 
no  elevating  amusements,  no  sweetness,  no 
song,  all  was  a  dreary  mud  flat  of  stale  life 
and  endless  grinding  toil. 

Contrasted  with  this  gloom  the  Christian 
man,  in  the  course  of  an  industrious  and  suc- 
cessful life,  fills  his  house  with  the  treasures  of 
art  and  literature  and  makes  it  sweet  with 
music  and  song.  Thus  he  gives  society  the 
surest  promise  of  a  power  to  rescue  their 
depraved  and  squalid  existence  from  the 
wretchedness  of  an  unbeautiful  life.  He  adorns 
his  rooms  with  the  choice  creations  of  the 
painter  and  sculptor,  and  articles  of  virtu  fill 
the  nooks  and  corners,  giving  evidence  of 
taste  and  travel  and  delighting  the  eye  on  every 
hand. 

His  children  also  are  taught  by  the  best 
masters  and  hear  the  best  interpretations  of 
music  and  dramatic  art.  They  procure  and 
read  the  newest  literature,  fitted  as  they  are 
for  its  appreciation  by  their  previous  studies  in 
school  and  college.  In  all  probability  their 
own  pastor  is  the  finest  interpreter  and  keenest 
critic   of  those  works  of  the  imagination,  the 


SOCIAL   BETTERMENT.  6 1 

knowledge  of  which  marks  one  as  a  person  of 
taste  and  education.  It  will  never  occur  to 
such  a  man  and  such  a  family  that  their  actions 
in  these  particulars  are  other  than  highly 
proper  and  the  inevitable  destiny  of  the  mind 
and  spirit  under  favorable  conditions. 

It  is  significant  that  the  strong  religious 
community  of  New  England,  after  performing 
its  own  proper  work  as  makers  of  society  and 
governors  of  the  same,  blossomed  out  as  men 
of  letters  and  poets.  Still  more  remarkable  to 
the  Christian  is  the  fact  that  the  sacred  books 
of  his  religion  are  acknowledged,  even  by  men 
of  the  world,  to  lie  at  the  basis  of  the  literary 
culture  of  every  modern  nation.  But  only 
with  such  an  educated  taste  and  disciplined 
mind  can  he  perceive  the  place  of  interest 
and  power  which  these  occupy  among  the  im- 
mortal products  of  literary  genius 

Amid  the  many  forces  which  have  compelled 
the  attention  of  thoughtful  men  to  the  claims 
of  Christianity,  none  have  been  so  strong  as 
the  example  of  a  refined,  educated  Chris- 
tian family,  whose  chief  pleasures  lie  in  the 
artistic  or  literary  taste  of  its  members,  and 
whose  home  life  was  broadened  and  sweetened 
by  the  exercise  of  those  rare  gifts  of  the  im- 
agination. Luther  himself  was  a  musician, 
and  claimed  that  music  and  song  of  right  be- 


62  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

longed  to  God.  "Why  should  the  devil  have 
all  the  best  music?"  Many  a  Christian  man 
has  asked  the  same  question  again  and  again, 
and  applied  it  to  all  art  and  literature. 

Certainly  not  every  Christian  man  who  suc- 
ceeds in  life,  fills  his  home  with  the  treasures 
of  art,  and  fits  his  family  for  the  apprecia- 
tion of  literature  and  music,  does  these  things 
with  the  purpose  of  service.  But  much  of 
the  service  which  Christianity  renders  to  the 
world  through  the  actions  of  Christian  men  is 
unconscious  service.  "They  builded  better 
than  they  knew, ' '  is  true  of  individuals  and  fam- 
ilies, as  it  is  true  of  communities  and  epochs. 

It  is  enough  to  say  that  the  person  so  acting 
feels  in  some  manner  the  call  to  be  an  exam- 
ple in  all  things.  To  furnish  his  children  with 
rational  interests,  to  provide  them  with 
healthy  and  sweet  amusements,  and  to  link 
them  by  all  the  choicest  fascinations  of  life  to 
home  he  knows,  by  instinct,  is  right;  and  it  is 
perhaps  a  recommendation  to  his  virtue  that  he 
has  unwittingly  furnished  a  genuine  example 
of  what  Christian  forces  would  do  for  every 
class  of  society  if  unhindered  in  their  opera- 
tion. 

At  all  events,  whenever  the  social  worker 
goes  into  the  dreary  regions  of  the  poor,  he 
soon  finds  that  those  arts,  sciences,  and  graces 


SOCIAL   BETTERMENT.  63 

of  culture  which  Christian  enterprise  and  thrift 
have  done  so  much  to  create  and  accumulate, 
are  urgently  needed  to  sweeten  and  beautify 
the  harsh  and  squalid  places  in  the  life  of  the 
poor.  The  strong,  noble  life  of  Christianity 
is  just  what  the  weak,  degraded  portion  of  so- 
ciety needs  to-day.  Selfhood,  with  all  its 
rich,  personal  possessions,  all  its  sweet  graces 
of  character  and  spirit,  all  its  accumulated 
culture,  all  its  hereditary  skill,  and  moral 
strength,  all  its  gathered  treasures  of  art  and 
literature  and  music,  all  its  wisdom  of  family 
training  and  education, — such  a  selfhood  is  the 
only  ground  of  hope  for  the  social  and  indus- 
trial, as  well  as  moral  betterment  of  the  sub- 
merged masses  of  society. 


VI. 


THE  MINISTRY   OF   WEALTH  IN   EDUCATION 
AND  PHILANTHROPY. 

The  greatest  service  that  Christianity  can 
render  to-day  in  the  cause  of  social  regenera- 
tion, lies  in  the  gifts  which  men  of  great  wealth 
can  render  to  public  institutions  of  education, 
art,  science,  and  literature,  including  schools 
of  technology,  and  public  parks,  recreation 
grounds,  and  centres  of  comfort. 

Without  doubt,  our  greatest  danger  lies  in 
the  curse  of  a  materialism,  which  makes  a  god 
of  "barren  well-being,"  "the  idolatry  of  the 
flesh  and  of  the  '  I,'  of  the  temporal,  and  of 
Mammon."  What  so  certain  a  corrective  of 
this  tendency  as  the  inculcation  in  the  minds 
of  our  sons  and  daughters  of  reverence  for  the 
works  of  the  spirit  and  the  imagination,  the 
divine  forces  in  nature,  and  the  stately  march 
of  mind  in  history? 

Our  American  life  needs  more  than  the  de- 
velopment of  its  material  powers  in  mines  and 
lumber  and  products  of  the  soil  and  the  loom: 
it  needs  a  native  science,  a  native  art,  and  a 
64 


WEALTH  IN  EDUCATION.  65 

native  literature.  If  patriotism  lies  close  to 
true  religion,  we  must  hasten  to  produce  our 
own  treasures  of  the  mind  and  spirit  before  our 
love  of  country  has  the  deathless  charm,  the 
holy  fascination,  which  clings  to  classic  lands 
of  story  and  song. 

Before  even  the  sacred  feet  of  Jesus  conse- 
crated the' 'Holy  Land"  it  was  consecrated 
to  heroism  by  Joshua,  Elijah,  and  the  Mac- 
cabees. Homer  and  Miltiades  made  Greece 
grand ;  the  martyrs  and  confessors  made 
Rome  holy.  Our  pilgrims  to-day  visit  the 
shrines  where  prophets  of  the  new  era  of 
freedom  suffered  and  saw  visions,  spots  made 
classic  and  dear  to  the  heart  by  poets,  temples 
filled  with  the  products  of  the  genius  and  toil 
of  painter  and  sculptor,  and  no  class  of  the 
people  feels  more  fully  the  soul  satisfaction  of 
these  treasures  of  fame  than  the  Christian  pub- 
lic. All  aims  of  life,  all  expenditures  of 
money,  all  patronage  of  art,  and  the  schools 
which  will  foster  and  produce  these  things,  are 
consistent  with  the  best  in  Christianity. 

These  works  can  not  be  forced ;  they  are  the 
outgrowth  of  a  rich  soil,  they  require  time, 
many  of  the  best  of  them  are  produced  in  pov- 
erty and  privation.  Still,  in  every  country 
where  they  have  come  to  maturity,  previous 
years  of  toil  and  accumulation  of  wealth  have 


66  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

elapsed;   education  in  literature,  science,  and 
art,  has  flourished;    freedom  has  made  some 
progress;   men  of  leisure  have  worked  them- 
selves, or  men  of  wealth  have  endowed  others 
with  the  conditions  of  working  without  care. 
The  imperious  cravings  of  the  body  have  first 
been  satisfied,  and  the  intellect  and  spirit  un- 
trammeled    have    ministered    to   life   in  those 
unperishable  interests  which  ennoble  humanity. 
In  the  creation  and  endowment  of  institutions 
of  this  order,  the  present  century  has  witnessed 
an  exhibition  of  Christian  beneficence  beyond 
parallel    in    the    history   of  the  world.*     We 
must    gather    up    into    a    shining   galaxy    the 
names  of  the  nobles  and  merchant  princes  of 
Venice,  Florence,  Amsterdam,  Paris,  London, 
and  Edinburgh,  like  Lorenzo  the  magnificent, 
Wolsey,    Richelieu,    Nassau,    Heriot,    and    a 
thousand   others,    builders   of  cathedrals,  pat- 
rons   of    art,     founders    of    universities    and 
libraries,    museums  and  hospitals,    before  we 
can  match  the  opulent  benefactions  of  the  pre- 

*The  report  of  gifts  and  bequests  for  public  purposes 
in  the  United  States  in  sums  of  $5,000  or  more  during 
1896,  as  compiled  by  Appleton's  Annual  Cyclopedia,  ex- 
ceeds $17,000,000.  This  includes  large  gifts  made  up  by 
the  combination  of  smaller  ones,  but  not  the  ordinary 
denominational  contributions  for  educational  and  benev- 
olent purposes  nor  state  and  municipal  appropriations 
to  public  institutions.  It  may  be  called  the  voluntary 
tax  of  the  well-to-do  toward  the  endowment  of  education 
and  charity.  In  1895  the  total  amount  recorded,  was 
$32,000,000. 


WEALTH  IN  EDUCATION.  67 

sent  era  to  education,   missions,  science,  art, 
city  adornment,  and  the  alleviation  of  distress. 
These  gifts  are   counted  in  one  city  of  the 
West    alone    as    running    into    many    millions 
of  dollars.     There  are  several  new  and  striking 
features  in   this  modern  princely  expenditure. 
Less   of   it   is  given   for  the  building  of  great 
churches  or  the  private  glory  of  the  benefac- 
tor in  tombs  and  memorial  structures ;  more  of 
it  is  in  the  immediate  direction  of  civic  enrich- 
ment and  for  the  advancement  and  enjoyment 
of    the    people.      Public  parks   and  museums 
and  art  galleries  and  libraries  form  a  not  in- 
considerable part   of  these  gifts.      But  it  is  in 
the  way  of  great  schools  of  the  higher  educa- 
tion— the  academy,  the  college,  and  the  univer- 
sity— that  the  most  remarkable  of  these  bene- 
factions are  exhibited.   Characteristic  of  the  age 
have  been  the  princely  endowments  of  great  in- 
stitutions of  technology  for  the  express  purpose 
of  connecting  the  finest  results  of  modern  sci- 
entific  research  and   polite  learning  with    the 
daily  life  and  practical  needs  of   the  working 
classes.      The  old  classic  curriculum,  still  the 
backbone  of  all  the  higher  learning,  has  been 
nobly  sustained — indeed,  in  the  older  founda- 
tions of    the   East,   and   in   the   newer  of  the 
West  it  has  secured  new  life  and  favor  under 
this  revival  of  generosity.      But  the  people,  as 


6S  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

represented  in  the  art  gallery,  museum,  public 
park,  institutions  of  technology,  and  social  set- 
tlements, have  been  the  chief  benefactors. 

Who  have  given  this  wealth?  The  mass  of 
this  modern  munificence  has  been  Christian  in 
the  strict  sense  of  that  term.  In  the  case  of 
considerable  gifts  like  museums  and  parks,  the 
object  has  been  purely  of  a  civic  and  educa- 
tional sort ;  but  in  the  case  of  the  great  major- 
ity of  libraries,  hospitals,  institutes  of  technol- 
ogy, academies,  colleges,  and  universities,  and 
social  work,  the  givers  are  Christians,  and  their 
benefactions  expressly  made  in  the  name  of 
Christianity  and  for  Christian  service  through 
these  channels. 

We  have  not  mentioned  here  the  ordinary 
currents  of  Christian  beneficence,  such  as  mis- 
sionary work  at  home  and  abroad,  endow- 
ment of  theological  seminaries  and  charitable 
work  strictly  so-called;  but  he  has  a  very 
superficial  knowledge  of  the  Christian  life  who 
fails  to  remember  that  a  very  large  share  of 
Christian  means  is  to-day  being  expended  on 
these  and  kindred  claims  of  the  church. 

It  is  true  that  a  very  large  part  of  this 
money  to-day,  as  in  the  past,  has  been  contri- 
buted by  the  poor.  "The  widow's  mite," 
the  poor  man  "out  of  his  poverty,"  have  con- 
tributed a  large  part  to  the  consecrated  reve- 


WEALTH  IN  EDUCATION.  69 

nues  which  have  carried  forward  the  work  of 
Christ  in  all  ages.  But  it  would  be  folly  to 
deny  that  many  of  our  church  buildings,  much 
of  our  missionary,  and  especially  our  educa- 
tional, work,  would  be  impossible  without  the 
large  benefactions  of  people  of  means. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  is  evident  that  those 
great  foundations  which  give  a  home  to  Art, 
Literature,  Science,  and  Education,  mak- 
ing original  investigation  possible,  endowing 
professional  instruction,  and  dealing  in  a  suc- 
cessful way  with  the  problems  of  our  great 
cities,  have  been  in  the  past,  and  are  now, 
the  creation  of  large  wealth.  Some  Christians 
of  to-day  have  recognized  this  fact  so  distinctly 
that  they  have  dedicated  great  fortunes  to 
special  causes  like  colleges  and  academies  in 
the  West,  and  give  on  principle  to  institutions 
which  are  certain  to  endure  through  many  gen- 
erations. 

Should  the  grateful  student  desire  to  pay 
for  his  university  education  at  its  full  money 
value  it  would  require  a  small  fortune  to  sat- 
isfy the  debt.  All  states  and  nations  recog- 
nize this  fact,  and  have  obtained  endow- 
ments either  from  the  wealth  of  princes  or 
the  taxes  of  a  province.  The  fee  is  no  pay- 
ment, only  an  acknowledgment  of  gratitude, 
on  the  part  of  the  recipient,   of  the  accumu- 


70  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

lated  wealth  and  learning  of  the  people  of 
past  ages. 

In  all  this  great  and  wide  field  of  service  the 
Christian  finds  his  grandest  opportunity  for 
the  use  of  the  means  which  great  success  has 
placed  at  his  command.  Many  of  the  most 
conscientious  give  on  an  ascending  scale  and 
on  principle,  as  an  evidence  of  gratitude  to 
God  for  material  prosperity.  This  is  not  only 
an  evidence  of  common  sense,  but  a  clear  fol- 
lowing of  the  apostle's  precept  to  "lay  by  as 
the  Lord  has  prospered  us. ' ' 

The  great  army  of  Christian  people  whom 
the  Lord  has  so  prospered,  in  all  ages,  would 
be  much  puzzled  at  many  of  the  new  doc- 
trines concerning  money,  which  are  abroad 
to-day.  From  the  days  of  Joseph  of  Arama- 
thea  to  our  own,  the  Gurneys,  the  Buxtons, 
the  Baxters,  the  Coats,  the  Spicers  of  Great 
Britain,  and  the  Hardies,  the  Slaters,  the 
Dodges,  and  the  Swetts  of  America,  have 
looked  upon  their  wealth  as  consecrated,  in 
large  measure,  to  this  special  form  of  service. 

And  they,  with  such  noble  princes,  as  John 
of  Gaunt,  David  of  Scotland,  the  leaders  of 
the  Commonwealth  of  England,  and  the  Cov- 
enant of  Scotland,  with  Lady  Huntington, 
Lord  Overton,  and  many  more,  would  be 
much  astonished  to  learn  that  the  service  which 


WEALTH  IN  EDUCATION.  71 

reflected  glory  on  their  age  and  untold  benefit 
upon  generations  following,  was  no  true  Chris- 
tian service  at  all.  If  then,  the  Christian  man 
of  to-day  is  to  follow  in  such  godly  and  noble 
footsteps,  he  must  attend  to  business  and 
regard  his  financial  success  as  prosperity  from 
the  Lord. 

We  may  be  prejudiced  in  this  matter  by 
much  of  the  glaring  inconsistency  of  Christian 
men  in  their  modern  business  methods.  We 
may  be  confused  by  the  conspicuous  eagerness 
of  all  classes  of  Christian  people  for  material 
prosperity.  We  may  be  amazed  by  the  fact 
that  many  Christians  who  are  so  prospered  of 
the  Lord  neither  "lay  by"  nor  give  under  im- 
pulse ;  but  we  are  to  remember  that  we  live  in 
a  country  and  an  age  when  material  interests 
are  the  engrossing  concern,  and  when  even  our 
Christian  teachers  are  sorely  tempted  to  make 
material  comfort  the  only  test  of  success  in 
life. 

Thus  arise  on  the  one  hand,  within  the 
church,  critics  of  the  social  order  who  deny  to 
Christians  the  right  to  the  accumulation  of  such 
wealth  at  all  or  to  the  cherishing  of  such  am- 
bitions. The  Psalmist's  description  of  the  man 
that  feareth  the  Lord  goes  for  nothing  with 
them.  It  looks  like  a  promise  from  another 
religion:    "His  seed   shall    be    mighty    upon 


72  SELFHOOD  AND   SERVICE. 

earth.  .  .  .  Wealth  and  riches  shall  be  in  his 
house."  If  they  had  lived  in  the  days  of  Ruth, 
they  would  have  been  ashamed  of  Boaz  be- 
cause he  was  a  man  of  wealth.  Wealth, 
worth,  and  valor,  or  any  conspicuous  trait  or 
possession  that  gives  individuality,  power, 
distinction,  and  constitutes  a  man  sheik,  chief, 
patron,  or  benefactor,  is  in  the  estimation  of 
this  class  of  thinkers  a  mark  of  vanity  and  in- 
consistent with  the  spirit  of  Christ.  These 
regard  the  subject  from  the  religious  viewing- 
point. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  are  those  who  on 
economic  grounds  consider  the  possession  of 
great  wealth  by  one  person  as  in  itself  an  evi- 
dence of  the  robbery  of  some  other.  Crude  as 
this  theory  of  wealth  is,  it  becomes  a  powerful 
argument  in  the  hands  of  a  man  of  the  world 
exposing    the    inconsistencies    of    Christians. 

Christians  have,  by  their  own  profession, 
renounced  the  world ;  what  right  have  they  to 
the  possession  of  wealth  and  worldly  distinc- 
tion? Thus  they  argue.  This  tone  gets  into 
conversation,  this  criticism  becomes  the  vogue, 
and  it  seems  at  first  sight  pious  to  agree  with 
it.  But  amid  all  this  pretension  to  a  superior 
piety  on  the  one  hand,  or  to  a  one-sided  polit- 
ical economy  on  the  other,  we  may  safely 
take  our  position  on  the  ground  of  the  historic 


WEALTH  IN  EDUCATION.  73 

examples  of  the  men  of  wealth  and  distinction, 
who  have  been  the  protectors  of  the  poor,  the 
patrons  of  art  and  science,  the  founders  of 
schools,  and  the  promoters  of  missions  in  every 
age  of  the  church's  history. 


VII. 

CHRISTIAN  SELFHOOD  DISTINGUISHED  FROM 
WORLDLY  CONFORMITY. 

In  considering  the  operation  of  Christian 
virtues,  both  in  the  individual  heart  and  the 
family  life  and  through  society,  in  the  former 
chapters,  we  have  dealt  with  actions  and  ideals 
which  may  reasonably  be  regarded  as  the  nor- 
mal Christian  course  of  life. 

We  have  not  considered  gross  acts  of  world- 
liness,  nor  ideals  that  every  one  regards  as 
apostacy  from  the  spirit  and  purpose  of  Christ. 
We  have  done  so  to  avoid  exceptions,  mon- 
strosities, and  all  peculiarities  of  locality,  age, 
and  personal  idiosyncracy.  We  have  been 
interested  in  the  "specimen  of  general  value." 

Some  may  think  we  have  allowed  too  much 
of  the  spirit  and  ways  of  the  world  to  belong 
to  Christian  society,  and  so  begged  the  whole 
question,  or  at  least  acknowledged  that  his- 
torical Christianity  had  failed  to  stem  the 
tide  of  worldly  conformity.  The  latter  part  of 
this  criticism,  we  indeed  allow,  has  consider- 
able force.  This  is  the  whole  ground  and 
74 


WORLDLY  CONFORMITY.  75 

reason  of  the  present  writing.  We  have 
sought,  in  leading  up  to  this  position,  how- 
ever, to  show  that  this  conformity  is  not  the 
result  of  special  acts  of  sin  done  apart  from 
the  normal  life,  or  particular  forms  of  pleasure, 
amusements,  occupations,  or  avocations,  in 
themselves  inconsistent.  Nor  does  it  lie  in 
exalted  rank,  genius,  or  great  wealth. 

A  paradox  seems  to  face  us  here ;  for  every 
observer  of  the  progress  of  society  sees  in 
the  Christian  community  which  accumulates 
wealth,  and  rises  to  distinction  in  arts,  letters, 
and  civics,  a  gradual  conformity  to  ideals  of 
life  and  practices  in  personal  and  social  con- 
duct that  must  be  classed  as  worldly. 

This  is  a  social  disaster.  The  patriot  who 
hailed  in  the  robust  manliness  of  the  first 
Christian's  faith,  the  promise  of  a  new  social 
order  is  disappointed ;  and  the  Christian  thinker 
who  saw  in  that  same  shining  devotion  of  the 
soul  to  Christ  the  power  of  a  new  type  of  man- 
hood is  sad  at  heart,  the  prophet  of  God  who 
thought  he  saw  the  first  rays  of  the  new  heaven 
and  the  new  earth  dawning  turns  away  and 
weeps.  No  disaster  is  so  terrible  to  a  sympa- 
thetic heart  as  the  loss  of  hope  concerning  an 
expected  salvation  of  the  people:  "We  hoped 
that  it  was  he  which  should  redeem  Israel." 
The  modern  thinker  and  lover  of  men,  who 


j6  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

has  seen  system  after  system  of  truth  tried, 
and  expedient  after  expedient  of  reform  fail, 
sees  the  gradual  dominance  of  the  worldly 
spirit  over  Christianity  with  keen  disappoint- 
ment, for  it  began  so  favorably  and  promised 
so  much.  But  experience  has  taught  him  to 
be  more  cautious  than  former  thinkers,  in  his 
opinions  as  to  the  real  source  of  the  evil  and 
the  remedy  that  will  cure  it. 

Could  we  say  that  it  is  wrong  for  a  Christian 
man  to  desire  personal  excellence,  either  in 
intelligence  or  character,  wrong  for  him  to 
seek  the  education  of  his  family  in  all  graces 
and  refinements  of  manner,  as  well  as  in  the 
schools,  and  the  studios;  wrong  for  him  to 
possess  property ;  wrong  to  order  his  household 
affairs  beyond  the  bare  sustenance  of  the 
body, — then  we  could  provide  a  cure,  and  one 
not  impossible  of  adoption.  For  such  ideas  have 
prevailed  in  many  instances  in  the  past;  and 
sumptuary  and  socialistic  schemes  have  given 
temporary  satisfaction  and  hope  to  many  earn- 
est souls. 

It  would  thus  be  quite  possible  for  us  to 
meet  the  emergency  by  obedience  to  a  pre- 
scribed form  of  dress,  the  practice  and  avoid- 
ance of  certain  amusements  and  recreations, 
and  the  adoption  of  particular  rules  regarding 
the  use  and  ownership   of   wealth.     But  we 


WORLD LT  CONFORMITY.  77 

have  seen  that  conformity  does  not  consist  in 
external  actions;  that  it  cannot  be  overcome 
by  a  new  rule,  but  by  a  new  spirit.  We  have 
seen  that  it  grows  in  soil  prepared  by  Christian 
virtue;  that  it  is  a  persistent,  natural,  and 
eternal  tendency  in  human  nature;  and  must 
therefore  be  met  by  forces  as  persistent,  natu- 
ral, and  eternal,  acting  on  that  same  nature. 

Conformity  is  the  crossing  of  the  invisible 
line  which  separates  the  Christian  virtue  of  self- 
improvement  from  the  vice  of  self-seeking.  It 
turns  the  evidences  of  God's  favor  into  op- 
portunities of  self-indulgence  and  pride.  It 
is  a  spirit,  a  tendency,  a  change  of  emphasis, 
an  ideal  of  life  produced  by  gradual,  subtle, 
invisible  changes  in  the  attitude  of  our  spirit 
towards  the  world  in  manners,  condition,  and 
opportunities  of  the  whole  life.  It  is  another 
instance  of  the  universal  law  of  all  things  that 
live  to  lose  their  pristine  purity, — "to  vaunt 
in  their  youthful  sap  at  height  decrease  and 
wear  their  brave  state  out  of  memory." 

We  have  forgotten  that  this  law  applies  to 
the  soul;  that  it  moves  with  a  resistless  ele- 
mental force  over  the  life  of  nations,  and  that 
it  can  be  met,  if  at  all,  only  by  laws  of  equal 
persistence  and  range.  It  is  another  illustra- 
tion of  the  great  spiritual  truth  that  "the  eter- 
nal life  must  be  eternally  reconquered." 


78  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

History  severely  teaches  us  that  all  arti- 
ficial remedies  for  this  great  evil  in  the  hu- 
man heart  and  society  are  worse  than  vain. 
They  invite  reaction,  they  end  in  disaster,  and 
spread  a  deeper  and  more  lasting  moral  ruin 
around  us.  Such  attempts  have  brought  con- 
tempt upon  the  strenuous  souls  who  have  seen 
more  in  life  than  personal  pleasure.  They 
have  set  back  the  hands  of  the  clock  of  Chris- 
tian progress,  and  given  nature  an  opportunity 
to  revenge  herself  on  us  for  our  folly. 

In  our  age  the  relation  of  natural  forces  to 
virtue  and  social  life  is  better  known  and  more 
considered  by  Christian  people — Nature — with 
the  capital  letter  indeed — is  baptized  into  the 
Christian  church.  We  are  therefore  in  a  posi- 
tion to  estimate  the  natural  forces  that  from 
generation  to  generation  act  upon  Christian 
people,  as  they  act  upon  all  others. 

We  remember  that  the  very  purpose  of 
grace  is  to  change,  correct,  improve,  or  regen- 
erate nature.  But  it  is  now  recognized  that 
such  operations  are  slow,  subject  still  to  law, 
and  will  revert  to  old  crudities  and  degenera- 
tions the  moment  the  improving  impulse  is 
removed.  Nay,  the  encouraging  fact  is  dis- 
covered that  Nature  wants  to  improve  rather 
than  otherwise.  All  her  myriad  seeds  are 
seeking  favorable  soil,  and  ready  to  take  ad- 


WORLDLT  CON  FORM  ITT.  79 

vantage  of  every  friendly  push  or  suggestion 
that  comes  along.  We  know  indeed  that 
every  improvement  in  flower  and  animal,  in 
mind  and  morals,  has  come  about  in  just  this 
way.  The  overwhelming  power  of  little 
things  has  been  forced  upon  us  at  the  point 
of  the  bayonet  of  science.  What  worms  have 
done  to  plow  and  fertilize  the  soil  of  the  whole 
earth,  the  elemental  changes  produced  by 
forces  all  but  invisible  and  creatures  appar- 
ently insignificant,  are  the  commonplaces  of 
modern  science. 

The  analogies  of  nature  teach  us  that  regen- 
erative and  purifying  energies  in  the  moral 
world  must  act  largely  on  the  same  princi- 
ples. And  most  certainly  all  those  forces  of 
Christianity  which  act  principally  on  genera- 
tions of  people  through  long  periods  of  his- 
tory, come  under  the  operation  of  the  same 
general  laws  as  lie  at  the  basis  of  continued 
improvement  in  nature.  Under  this  light  the 
conversion  of  the  individual  soul  is  the  first 
conscious  impulse  towards  the  higher  life, 
both  for  the  individual  and  society;  but  it  is 
not  an  unrelated  event  apart  from  the  spirit- 
ual series  which  has  been  going  on  in  Christian 
society  from  the  beginning. 

And  its  reality  is  evidenced  by  the  propaga- 
tion of  a  new  life  to  others.     Such  a  force  will 


So  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

take  advantage  of  every  aid  or  suggestion  of 
betterment  for  its  individual  and  social  im- 
provement. It  is  entirely  beyond  our  province 
to  discuss  the  theology  of  this  doctrine, — as  to 
whether  this  impulse  is  supernatural  and  a 
communication  of  divine  energy.  Our  object 
is  simply  to  show  that  being  here,  as  the 
unique  and  magnificent  contribution  of  Chris- 
tianity to  the  regeneration  of  the  moral  life  of 
the  world,  its  final  fruits  and  crowning  tri- 
umphs over  society,  come  by  the  operation  of 
natural  law  in  the  sphere  of  nature. 

Its  operations  are  not  helped,  but  frus- 
trated, by  any  and  all  expedients  which  rule  it 
out  of  nature,  which  make  it  exceptional, 
local,  accidental,  and  subject  to  arbitrary  laws 
of  life. 

Christianity  is  thus  a  part  of  Nature  in  the 
broadest  sense  of  that  term.  It  is  the  crown 
and  glory  of  those  inspiring  mental  and  spirit- 
ual forces  which  save  men.  It  comes  upon 
our  life  with  imperial  commands,  with  gracious 
and  resistless  persuasions.  It  leaves  no  part 
untouched  and  suffers  no  rival  claimant  to 
power. 

If,  then,  it  is  to  continue  to  operate  on  soci- 
ety as  it  operates  on  the  individual  soul,  and 
if  it  is  to  act  with  the  full  force  of  this  ele- 
mental moral  energy  on  the  man  of  education 


WORLDLY  CONFORMITT.  Si 

and  wealth  to-day,  as  it  acted  on  the  first 
Christians,  we  must  find  some  explanation  of 
the  Christian  life  which  recognizes  and  gives 
full  force  to  this  universal  principle  in  our  re- 
ligion. We  must  find  an  ideal  of  society 
which  puts  in  its  right  place  this  primary  in- 
stinct of  the  Christian  to  self-improvement ; 
which  makes  him  a  powerful  factor  in  the  pro- 
duction of  wealth ;  which  gives  him  social 
buoyancy  and  forces  him  into  eminence; 
which  bestows  such  qualities  of  mind  and  heart 
as  make  him  a  moulder  and  leader  in  the  best 
society;  which  creates  even  the  noblest  forms 
of  art  and  literature,  and  impels  him  to  lay  the 
foundations  of  strong,  free,  great  nations  and, 
in  a  word,  confers  on  him  this  victorious  ele- 
ment of  life  which  conquers  the  world  on  it 
own  battle-ground. 


VIII. 

PERSONAL  SERVICE  THE  NEW  IDEAL  OF 
CHRISTIANITY. 

It  is  easy  to  criticise,  and  break  down:  it 
is  difficult  to  build  up  and  create.  We  have 
no  inclination,  as  the  habit  of  some  is  (following 
the  example  of  Carlyle),  "to  rave  at  everything 
and  propose  nothing." 

We  must  find  a  principle  of  life  in  relation 
to  the  wealth  of  the  Christian  which  shall 
recognize  all  the  facts  of  nature  and  religion 
enumerated  and  illustrated  in  these  pages.  It 
must  first  of  all  recognize  the  inviolability  of 
personal  liberty  and  the  personal  ownership 
of  property.  It  must,  on  the  other  hand,  be 
able  to  deal  with  this  persistent  and  unsleep- 
ing tendency  of  human  nature  to  deteriorate 
and  lose  the  pristine  simplicity  and  love  and 
zeal  of  the  highest.  It  must  be  an  honest 
effort  to  cure  a  real  trouble  in  the  social  life  of 
Christian  peoples,  more  dangerous  in  propor- 
tion as  they  are  more  prosperous,  old,  and  set- 
tled. It  must  not  cripple  the  Christian's  ener- 
gies nor  handicap  his  functions  as  a  wealth 
82 


PERSONAL   SERVICE.  S3 

producer.  It  must  not  build  an  artificial 
Chinese  wall  about  his  life,  nor  make  his  man- 
ner of  life  peculiar,  local,  or  unnatural.  It 
must  not  interfere  with  his  political  or  civil 
liberty,  nor  with  his  duty  to  himself  in  the 
development  of  every  power  of  the  body  or 
the  mind  in  the  large  outlook  of  modern  Chris- 
tian culture  or  service.  And  it  may  be  added 
that  it  ought  not  tend  to  create  a  special  sect 
or  church  out  of  the  people  who  adopt  it  as  an 
ideal  of  life. 

We  want  in  fact,  a  novus  or  do  secular  um, 
but  not  in  the  spirit  of  Separatists  from  the 
old  order,  in  the  material  and  political  sphere 
of  our  life.  The  new  order  of  the  ages  may 
be  found  to  be  nothing  very  new  after  all: 
indeed,  to  us,  it  comes  with  all  the  more  as- 
surance of  value  as  something  which  has  been 
tried,  on  a  limited  field  at  least,  and  proved  so 
far,  successful. 

Experienced  and  practical  minds  have  a  de- 
cided distrust  of  social  and  religious  panaceas 
which  are  announced  as  absolutely  sure  cures, 
hitherto  unheard-of  truths.  Truths  which 
the  Christian  church  has  for  two  millenniums 
entirely  overlooked,  and  are  only  now  discov- 
ered by  the  new  social  prophets,  are  on  that 
ground  alone  to  be  received  with  distrust  and 
applied  with  great  caution. 


84  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

The  remedy  proposed  in  these  pages  has 
no  such  peculiar  claims  to  our  attention.  It 
is  not  a  mystery  hidden  in  the  ages,  but  a 
principle  of  life  and  action  which  all  truly  spir- 
itual souls  have   recognized  and   acted   upon. 

It  is  the  use  of  wealth,  not  its  limitation, 
which  alone  can  furnish  such  a  principle  and 
ideal  for  the  new  order  of  the  ages.  This 
principle  has  been  recognized  and  acted  upon 
by  all  those  individuals  and  families  whose 
life  work  and  character  have  already  been  re- 
ferred to  as  examples  of  the  wise  and  virtuous 
stewards  of  wealth.  In  every  case  where 
Christian  families  are  to-day  exercising  large 
influence  for  good  order,  honor,  purity,  be- 
nevolence, and  philanthropy,  this  has  been  the 
principle  of  their  family  life.  It  is  simply  be- 
cause these  families  have  been  so  few  and  ex- 
ceptional to  the  great  mass  of  our  Christian 
people  that  this  principle  has  not  been  felt,  as 
it  should  have  been,  on  a  national  or  universal 
scale. 

We  believe  the  time  has  fully  come  for  its 
universal  acknowledgment  and  adoption  by 
advanced  Christian  thinkers  and  workers,  as 
the  fundamental  principle  in  their  social  life. 
To  this  end,  it  must  be  fully  set  forth  in  all  its 
wide  scope  and  deep  reach,  through  every 
form  of  modern  thought  and  activity. 


PERSONAL  SERVICE.  85 

What  hope  have  we,  that  a  theory  of  life, 
long  known  but  not  universally  adopted,  will 
become  a  new  force  to-day?  What  reason  have 
we  for  believing  that  the  Christian  church  will 
fall  in  love  with  this  ideal  now,  if  she  has  not 
done  so  before?  There  are  several  reasons,  in 
the  trend  of  modern  Christian  thought  and 
the  change  of  emphasis  on  ideals  of  social  ob- 
ligation, which  warrant  the  belief  that  we  are 
entering  upon  a  new  era  of  Christian  character 
and  service.  There  is  a  growing  conviction 
in  the  breasts  of  earnest  Christian  men  that, 
through  the  long  years  of  heroism  and  self-sac- 
rifice in  the  history  of  European  and  Ameri- 
can Christianity,  we  have  won  only  the  out- 
ward framework  of  liberty.  We  have  secured 
only  the  political  form.  The  essential  spirit 
of  liberty  in  the  mastery  of  our  own  evil  tend- 
encies we  have  not  yet  won. 

The  very  successes  of  the  church  have,  as 
time  passed  by,  confounded  her  with  the  forces 
of  the  world.  And  consequently  new  ideals 
of  life  must  be  adopted  to  infuse  new  spirit 
and  purpose  into  her  thought  and  action  in 
the  future. 

This  is  a  return  to  first  principles,  but 
the  human  mind,  in  returning  to  first  princi- 
ples either  in  art,  politics,  or  religion,  never 
goes   back   with    the    same    mental    or  moral 


S6  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

equipment  with  which  the  first  disciples 
adopted  those  principles.  This,  in  reality,  is 
our  ground  of  hope.  We  do  not  to-day  advise 
a  return  to  first  principles  and  to  the  simplicity 
of  the  Gospel,  ignorant  of  those  truths  con- 
cerning human  nature,  history,  and  economics 
which  characterized  the  first  disciples.  They 
had  the  future,  like  a  trackless  forest,  all  before 
them.  We  have  returned  upon  their  footsteps 
to  find  this  forest  a  cultivated  country,  full  of 
cities  and  busy  with  mills  and  mines,  and  all 
the  wonders  of  art  and  literature.  We  have, 
above  all,  the  incomparable  object-lessons  of 
two  thousand  years  of  the  operation  of  Chris- 
tian ideas  upon  the  spiritual,  artistic,  political, 
and  social  forces  of  human  nature. 

We  do  not  possess,  it  is  true,  the  fiery  zeal 
and  the  splendid  enthusiasm  of  those  first 
disciples,  who,  under  the  expectation  of  an  im- 
mediate return  of  the  Lord  Jesus  and  a  final 
consummation  of  all  things,  were  looking  and 
working  for  a  new  heaven  and  a  new  earth. 
Our  hearts  are  sobered  by,  and  our  minds 
opened  to,  the  larger  and  more  mysterious 
facts  of  life,  which,  under  the  long  discipline 
of  the  Holy  Spirit  for  nigh  two  thousand 
years,  have  been  impressed  upon  us. 

We  have  seen  that  it  is  apparently  God's 
purpose  that  even  the  Kingdom  of  Christ  shall 


PERSONAL   SERVICE.  87 

come  under  the  dominion  of  those  laws  of  the 
universal  life  which  require  ages  and  millen- 
niums for  their  complete  fulfillment.  We 
have  discerned  the  reach  and  power  of  hered- 
ity and  the  force  of  example  and  custom 
handed  down  from  generation  to  generation. 
We  do  not  readily  to-day  build  false  hopes  of 
a  speedy  success  even  in  good  works.  We 
rely  very  largely  on  education,  or  processes  of 
development  and  betterment,  that  go  on  from 
one  generation  of  the  godly  to  another. 

To  return  therefore,  to  the  first  principles 
of  our  faith,  does  not  mean  retrogression. 
It  is  not  the  action  of  the  sectarian  vision- 
ary dazzled  with  the  brightness  of  the  past 
but  blinded  to  the  lessons  of  the  present.  It 
is  the  action  of  the  scholar  and  believer,  who 
knows  and  loves  the  great  ideals  of  the  past, 
but  who  brings  to  that  past  also  the  treasures 
of  experience  and  discipline  of  the  present. 
This  is  the  condition  of  all  true  human  prog- 
ress, civil  and  religious. 

We  are  in  a  state  of  mind  to-day  when 
no  lesson  in  church  or  state  is  being  lost  upon 
us.  We  are  impatient  of  idiosyncracies,  of 
half-truths,  of  paths  that  lead  nowhere,  of 
grinding  cycles  of  meaningless  misery  to  soci- 
ety. We  love  realities.  We  prefer  to  be 
doing  something  rather  than  dreaming  about 


88  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

doing  it.  If  we  have  not  the  lofty  visions, 
the  purifying  spiritual  enthusiasm  of  the  early 
days,  we  have  the  caution  and  practicality 
come  of  long  experience ;  and  we  share  equally 
with  them  the  ultimate  conviction  that  life 
is  vain  if  we  cannot  redeem  men  from  the 
power  of  sin,  and  lift  society  into  a  loftier 
plane  of  living,  both  in  its  material  and  moral 
experiences. 

However  much  thinking  men  may  differ 
as  to  methods  in  the  accomplishment  of  the 
great  work  of  the  Kingdom,  both  as  regards 
the  evangelization  of  the  unbelieving  world 
or  the  Christian  culture  of  the  professors  of 
faith  in  Christ,  there  is  no  difference  in  the 
facts  of  history  brought  up  to  date.  We 
know  what  truths  have  been  emphasized,  and 
what  ideals  of  life  have  been  set  before  men 
during  those  years  of  Christian  instruction  in 
the  past ;  and  we  know  just  what  the  results  are. 

No  one  regards  the  present  situation  as  satis- 
factory. There  is  the  most  ominous  agreement 
on  this  point,  both  by  those  who  love  the 
church  and  by  those  who  hate  her.  The  one 
part  may  say  it  is  because  the  true  doctrine  of 
Christianity  has  not  been  accepted  and  acted 
upon  by  the  people,  and  the  other  part  may 
say  the  true  doctrine  has  not  been  preached, 
but  both  agree  that  Europe  and  America,  in 


PERSONAL   SERVICE.  89 

the  nineteenth  century  of  our  Lord,  does  not 
present  that  face  of  heavenly  splendor,  that 
front  of  power,  and  that  heart  unspotted  from 
the  world,  which  the  Founder's  character  and 
its  first  disciples'  faith  and  heroism  led  us  to 
expect. 

Another  class  smile  cynically  at  this  heated 
discussion,-  believing  that  both  these  disputants 
are  missing  the  great  lessons  of  the  past  and 
the  real  requirements  of  the  present.  They 
think  that  all  altruistic  plans  for  social  better- 
ment are  doomed  to  failure.  But  because  cer- 
tain lines  of  action  and  systems  of  doctrine 
have  not  produced  upon  the  world  all  that 
their  first  sanguine  promoters  expected,  it  by 
no  means  follows  that  those  doctrines  were 
false  or  those  methods  foolish.  They  may 
have  been  better  for  their  own  age  than  other 
ideas  and  methods  regarded  with  more  favor 
to-day.  On  the  other  hand,  doctrines  and 
methods  that  saved  and  inspired  the  lives  of 
men  of  the  past  may  have  become  powerless 
to  accomplish  the  same  class  or  extent  of 
results  in  the  present. 

Most  certainly  the  failures  to  produce  the 
best  results  on  any  universal  scale  justify  the 
reconsideration  of  old  ideas  and  methods  in 
the  light  of  all  the  history  and  experiences  of 
the  Church  of  Christ.     This  thought,  it  will 


90  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

be  observed,  is  based  upon  the  fact  that  the 
history  and  experience  of  the  church  comes 
from  the  instruction  and  guidance  of  the  Holy 
Spirit.  If  this  position  is  not  granted  to  us 
by  all  Christian  thinkers,  we  are  paralyzed  in 
our  efforts  for  improvement.  But  we  believe 
none  will  deny  it.  It  is  an  evidence  of 
the  continued  life  and  power  of  the  church  to 
be  able  to  adapt  her  methods  and  to  better 
understand  her  doctrines  in  the  new  light 
which  is  continually  breaking  out  of  the  Word 
of  God  and  the  book  of  history. 

Because  of  this  hopeful  principle  of  Christian 
progress  many  conservative  thinkers  to-day 
are  looking  back  to  the  life  of  the  Founder  of 
our  faith  for  their  guidance  and  inspiration. 
They  are  coming  again  to  His  teachings  and 
the  teaching  of  His  apostles  and  first  disciples 
with  new  difficulties  and  new  questions,  but 
at  the  same  time  with  fresh  enlightenment  and 
fresh  ideals  growing  out  of  the  mistakes  as  well 
as  the  victories  of  the  past. 

Our  age  is  one  of  reconstruction  in  church 
and  state:  new  methods  are  demanded,  new 
responsibilities  are  being  felt,  and  new  mean- 
ing and  forces  are  being  added  to  old  doc- 
trines. There  never  was  a  time  of  change 
when  so  many  indications  of  success  were 
present  or  so  many  reasons  for  hope  pressed 


PERSONAL   SERVICE.  9 1 

themselves  upon  earnest,  open-eyed  workers 
and  thinkers. 

During  the  now  closing  century  the  revo- 
lution in  European  politics,  the  appearance 
and  growth  of  the  Western  Republic,  the 
changes  in  modern  life  and  thought  produced 
by  steam,  electricity,  and  the  mechanical  in- 
ventions, the  spread  of  popular  education,  and 
the  marked  increase  in  the  material  prosperity 
of  the  common  people  have  all  helped  to  cre- 
ate new  ideas  about  and  impose  new  duties 
upon  wealth. 

New  social  claims  and  physical  wants  have 
arisen  in  places  long  deprived  and  unregard- 
ed. New  compunctions  have  awakened  in 
the  breasts  of  possessors.  New  avenues  of 
service  have  been  opened  or  at  least  seized  for 
the  first  time.  New  powers  of  appreciation  of 
the  social  and  economic  bearing  of  Christian 
doctrine  have  been  developed  by  the  teachings 
of  the  church  in  the  minds  of  the  general  public. 

The  church  herself  is  braced  to  a  higher 
conception  of  duty  and  to  a  diviner  life  by  the 
spread  of  her  own  principles.  No  one  speaks 
with  contempt  to-day  of  men  of  another  class 
or  persuasion,  and  all  genuine  souls  are  eager 
to  find  a  solution  of  the  problem  of  life  which 
will  give  play  to  the  redeemed  powers  of  man- 
hood in  a  regenerated  social  order. 


IX. 

MODERN    LESSONS    ON    CHRISTIANITY    AND 
WEALTH. 

It  may  be  well  to  state  in  brief  those  truths 
the  church  has  learned  about  herself  in  her 
relations  to  wealth  and  social  life,  and  what 
both  Christianity  and  the  world  have  also  dis- 
covered as  to  the  social  function  and  real  value 
of  material  prosperity. 

We  practical  moderns  have  lost  somewhat 
of  the  poetry  of  life,  but  we  have  gained  in 
clearness  and  consequent  sincerity.  It  is  a 
process  often  necessary  before  we  can  gain  the 
true  basis  of  a  new  poetry.  The  church  is 
more  sincere  about  herself  to-day,  she  is  get- 
ting back  to  a  love  of  reality  and  simplicity, 
and  is  feeling  already  the  breath  of  a  divine 
inspiration.  This  comes  of  a  new  sense  of  the 
value  of  the  character  and  teaching  of  her 
divine  Founder.  Especially  has  interest  deep- 
ened by  considering  the  practical  bearing  of 
His  example  upon  our  thought  and  action  in 
our  present  earthly  career. 

During  the  first  few  centuries  of  our  era 
92 


CHRISTIANITY  AND    WEALTH.  93 

Christianity  was  under  the  sway  of  a  one- 
sided doctrine  of  separation.  The  crystal  pur- 
ity of  her  conception  of  personal  holiness,  in 
contrast  with  the  dark  facts  of  the  heathen  life 
out  of  which  she  was  saved,  created  a  distinct 
separation  in  character.  The  new  ideals  of 
the  divine  Kingdom  in  contrast  with  the  cru- 
elty and  oppression  of  the  kings  and  conquer- 
ors of  those  unsettled  times  bred  a  sacred  pas- 
sion of  hatred  for  tyranny  disguised  as  govern- 
ments of  the  world.  Those  forms  of  life  and 
powers  of  government  which  Christianity  found 
to  be  her  deadly  enemies  she  naturally  thought 
of  as  doomed  to  certain  destruction. 

In  her  teaching  she  gradually  separated  the 
sacred  from  the  secular.  "Man  was  broken 
up  into  parts  an  outer  and  inner."  "The 
world  into  earth  and  heaven,  hell  and  para- 
dise." "This  was  done  it  is  true  in  order  to 
construct  man  more  profoundly  and  truly. 
But  Christianity  has  not  digested  this  powerful 
leaven.  She  has  not  yet  conquered  her  true 
humanity;  she  is  still  living  under  the  anti- 
nomy of  sin  and  grace,  of  here  below  and  there 
above.  She  has  not  penetrated  into  the  whole 
heart  of  Jesus."  These  words  from  one  of 
the  profoundest  spiritual  thinkers  of  our  age 
show  just  how  such  a  nature  as  Amiel's,  always 
yearning  after  the  "totality   of   being,"    was 


94  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

affected  by  this  one-sided  phase  of  Christian 
teaching. 

Thus  for  ages  the  mighty  spiritual  forces 
generated  by  the  Gospel  were  used  up  by  be- 
lievers largely  in  the  effort  to  save  their  own 
souls  from  the  city  of  destruction.  The  world 
and  its  material  interests  had  nothing  for 
them ;  left  to  brood  and  dream  if  of  a  mystical 
turn  of  mind,  to  scheme  and  plot  for  a  spirit- 
ual dominion  over  the  government  of  this 
world  if  of  an  active  and  ambitious  genius. 

At  last  a  religious  life  became  possible  only 
by  physical  separation  from  the  world  of 
men,  and  the  burial  of  the  body  in  the  liv- 
ing tomb  of  cell  or  cave.  This  phase  of  ex- 
aggeration might  have  passed  away,  or  been 
sloughed  off  for  a  more  rational  doctrine,  if 
the  error  had  touched  only  the  lives  of  nuns 
and  monks,  anchorites  and  recluses.  But  it 
affected  the  thinking  and  action  of  the  com- 
mon people  also.  They  were  compelled  by 
the  exigencies  of  their  labor  for  daily  bread 
to  reconcile  a  doctrine  which  degraded  the 
physical  nature  with  the  imperious  cravings 
of  that  same  nature  supposedly  implanted  by 
the  Creator.  They  could  not  retire  from  the 
world,  they  had  still  to  work  in  the  open  field 
of  public  life. 

But   among  those  common  men   also  great 


CHRISTIANITT  AND    WEALTH.  95 

spiritual  forces  had  been  awakened,  espe- 
cially at  the  period  of  the  Reformation  in 
Europe.  They  were  still  under  the  dominion 
of  "here  and  there,"  and  "outer  and  inner," 
"a  secular  and  a  sacred."  Individualism  had 
done  its  best  for  them  under  this  scheme  of  life, 
and  perhaps  also  its  worst.  They  were  saved, 
their  life  was  in  heaven ;  religiously  they  were  a 
separate  people;  they  sought  a  new  country. 
But  materially,  politically,  and  as  the  founders 
of  families,  the  creators  of  states  and  nations, 
they  were  yet  living  on  earth.  They  were 
bound  by  its  laws,  statute  and  natural,  they 
were  influenced  by  material  interests  and  by 
human  ambitions  perhaps  more  than  they 
thought. 

Gradually,  insidiously,  but  with  fatal  thor- 
oughness, their  religious  experience,  prevented 
from  becoming  a  universal  principle  of  hu- 
man action,  became  a  mere  form  and  fash- 
ion of  the  soul,  often  bereft  of  reality,  always 
shorn  of  power.  It  was  found  impossible 
to  continue  to  attach  the  energies  and  in- 
terests of  the  new-born  Christian  soul  to  a 
domain  of  life  limited  in  time,  place,  and  sub- 
ject. Religion,  largely  bereft  of  the  tran- 
scendent interest  of  present  reality,  was  rele- 
gated to  churches,  priests,  and  dying  people. 
The  courage,  ambition,   talent,    industrial  en- 


96  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

ergies  of  men,  professedly  Christian,  were 
given  to  government,  business,  science,  art, 
and  letters.  Wealth  production,  as  the  com- 
mon measure  of  all  forms  of  activity,  claimed 
its  leading  share  of  those  powers,  and  Chris- 
tian men  manifested  the  qualities  of  their  new 
life  by  activities  along  those  lines  thus  opened 
up  to  them  by  the  social  conditions  and  reli- 
gious ideas  of  their  age.  Balzac,  with  a  certain 
contempt  for  the  thrifty  virtues  of  the  Hugue- 
nots, points  out  that  all  Protestants  are  char- 
acterized by  this  same  trait.  They  profess 
great  unworldliness,  but  are  the  great  traders 
and  manufacturers  and  money-getters  of  the 
world. 

Thus  the  intellectual  and  spiritual  powers 
of  man  awakened  by  Christianity,  perverted 
by  a  one-sided  doctrine  of  life,  are  diverted 
with  resistless  energy  into  channels  of  money- 
making,  which  in  turn  destroy  the  original 
spiritual  conception  of  life  revealed  by  Chris- 
tianity. Such  facts  as  these  writ  large  on  the 
page  of  history  teach  us  just  exactly  what  the 
church  can  do  in  the  old  way;  not,  we  must 
be  allowed  to  say,  with  the  "old  Gospel,"  but 
with  the  old  way  of  interpreting  the  Gospel, 
especially  in  its  relation  to  our  present  life. 

The  method  which  resulted,  in  a  few  cen- 
turies, in  the  conformity  of  the  church  to  the 


CHRISTIANITY  AND    WEALTH.  97 

world  and  the  conversion  of  the  divine  regen- 
erative energies  of  Christianity  into  engines  of 
personal  ambition  and  wealth  production  must 
necessarily  be  defective.  Some  saving  truth 
has  been  missed,  some  governing  corrective 
idea  has  been  lost  sight  of.  The  emphasis 
upon  the  salvation  of  the  individual  soul,  upon 
its  eternal  destiny,  upon  the  transcendent 
importance  of  the  spiritual,  has  been  overdone. 

The  mutual  and  corrective  truth  that  the 
secular  is  sacred,  that  "the  there  is  here,"  that 
"heaven  is  in  the  heart,"  and  "the  Kingdom 
of  God  within  us,"  must  be  recognized  by 
the  church.  We  know  that  as  we  cannot  fly 
with  one  wing,  we  cannot  be  saved  by  a  one- 
sided Christian  faith  and  life.  The  individual 
is  the  source  but  not  the  end  of  power,  the 
seed  of  a  divine  Kingdom  is  in  his  heart,  but 
it  must  be  sown  in  the  soil  of  the  present  life 
and  gather  its  larger  nature  from  all  influences 
of  earth  and  sky.  The  social  salvation  is  an 
integral  part  of  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom. 
Unless  the  individual  lives  to  save  society  he 
can  not  live  unto  the  larger  life  of  the  Spirit 
of  Christ. 

Nay,  society  will  turn  her  forces  of  evil  upon 
his  selfish  spirituality  and  destroy  it  root  and 
branch.  Christian  thinkers  have  learned  that 
a   doctrine   of  personal  salvation  unrelated  to 


98  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

society  and  mundane  existence  is  helpless  to 
redeem  the  world  for  Christ  and  to  keep  the 
church  unspotted  from  the  world.  They  know 
that  to  awaken  in  the  soul  of  man  the  ideals 
and  energies  which  the  Gospel  has  power  to 
do,  as  far  as  the  development  and  culture  of 
the  individual  is  concerned,  and  throw  him 
upon  life  without  the  restraint  of  the  social 
obligations  immediately  growing  out  of  the 
possession  of  these  powers,  is  to  result  finally 
in  the  deterioration  and  the  corruption  of  the 
church.  And  the  hopeless,  sickening  sense 
of  such  a  cycle  of  victory  and  defeat,  returning 
upon  all  Christian  effort,  brings  despair  to  the 
hearts  of  the  lovers  of  humanity.  They  are 
convinced,  therefore,  that  these  two  thousand 
years  are  sufficient  to  have  taught  the  universal 
church  the  necessity  of  a  new  method,  com- 
prehensive of  all  life,  and  embracing  the  use 
of  every  energy  in  the  regenerated  soul. 

Side  by  side  with  this  lesson,  and  throwing 
much  light  upon  it,  have  also  arisen  new  ideas 
concerning  the  obligations  and  functions  of 
wealth.  We  know  better  to-day,  Christian 
men,  and  men  of  the  world  also,  just  what 
wealth  can  and  can  not  do.  Paradoxical  as  it 
may  seem,  wealth  is  both  exalted  and  abased 
to-day  in  the  estimation  of  thoughtful  men. 
Used  to  benefit  others — wisely,  as  administered 


CHRISTIANITY  AND    WEALTH.  99 

by  men  of  great  experience  in  affairs — it  has 
all  but  unlimited  powers  of  good ;  used  to 
gratify  appetites  and  personal  luxury,  it  is  as 
the  apples  of  Sodom,  dust  and  ashes  between 
the  teeth.  Used  to  equip,  educate,  refine, 
enlarge  by  travel  and  broader  social  service,  it 
is  the  handmaid  of  all  noble  spirits,  the 
means  of  cultivating  the  peculiar  grace  for 
which  princes  and  lords  of  old  were  counted 
excellent  and  generous.  Used  to  aggrandize 
family  greed,  ambition,  and  trusts,  it  is  an  in- 
strument of  tyranny  and  ominous  to  the  safety 
of  society. 

As  long  as  the  passion  of  wealth  getting  is 
on  the  man  these  great  ideas  of  the  age  may 
be  absent  or  feeble,  but  sooner  or  later  the 
lessons  of  the  common  experience  come  home 
to  him.  "Is  the  game  worth  the  candle?"  Is 
all  this  worry,  toil,  and  defeat  of  the  higher 
end  of  life  wise,  in  view  of  the  limited  power 
of  money  at  best?  These  reflections  come  with 
redoubled  force  when  it  is  rather  a  question 
of  heaping  up  more  than  one  can  use. 

The  Christian  man  must  be  even  more  deep- 
ly impressed  with  these  facts  touching  the 
moral  value  of  wealth.  The  initial  impulse 
of  an  earnest,  ambitious,  industrious  life  may 
have  carried  him  far;  he  pauses  to  contrast 
the  ideals  with  which  he  started  out,  with  the 


ioo  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

ideals  and  purposes  now  governing  his  life. 
He  may  have  missed  the  personal  culture 
largely  because  he  has  confounded  the  means 
with  the  end.  He  finds  himself  in  possession, 
but  not  capable  of  enjoyment.  He  has  no 
time  and  no  inclination  for  pleasures  and  ser- 
vices which  he  had  hoped  would  be  greatly 
possible  by  means  of  the  larger  wealth.  His 
own  inability  to  obtain  the  best,  and  the  re- 
quirements of  less  fortunate  lives  to  share  his 
abundance,  come  with  combined  force  upon 
his  spirit.  Or  even  if  he  has  carried  a  finely 
balanced  life  all  along,  knows  himself  the 
larger,  deeper  life  of  the  spirit,  has  kept  in 
touch  with  the  widening,  uplifting  breath  of 
the  modern  intellect  in  science,  art,  and  litera- 
ture,— such  a  man,  in  the  new  atmosphere  of 
social  obligations,  will  best  read  his  larger  op- 
portunities, for  he  knows  what  faith  and  love, 
education  and  refinement  can  accomplish. 

We  are  thus  facing  the  problem  of  wealth 
as  no  other  period  of  Christian  history  has 
been  able  to  do.  We  are  face  to  face  with  its 
powers  and  its  limitations,  its  obligations  and 
its  rights,  with  an  equipment  of  experience  and 
thought  which  no  other  time  possessed.  The 
Christians  are  possessors  of  the  wealth  and 
power,   the  science  and  the  art,  the  education 


CHRISTIANITY  AND    WEALTH.        101 

and  freedom  which  it  is  proposed  to  use  for 
higher  ends.  This  puts  us  in  a  very  different 
position  from  those  who  are  discussing  a  sub- 
ject of  which  they  know  nothing,  and  dispos- 
ing of  means  which  they  never  created. 

This  wealth  has  been  made  under  Christian 
forms  of  government  and  rules  of  social  and 
business  life  which  have  grown  up  in  so-called 
Christian  lands.      In  close  daily  touch  with  the 
industry  and  skill   of  the    workman    and    the 
enterprise    and    genius    of    the    manager   and 
inventor  have  been  the  knowledge,  the  pray- 
ers, the  hopes,  and  impulses  of  Christian  lives. 
We   can    not    say  let   us   wait  till  we  form  a 
Christian  Society  before  we  can  tell  what  the 
effect  of  wealth  upon  Christians  will  be.     We 
know  now.     We  have   seen   its  best   and  its 
worst  under  the  old  ideals.     We  are  not  satis- 
fied.    It  has   not   done  as  much  for  us  as  it 
promised  at  starting  out.      It  has  not  done  as 
much  for  our  families  and  our  nation  as  we 
have  just   reason    to   believe   it   can  do.    We 
are  conscious  of  needs  it  has  never  ministered 
to  and  conditions  from  which  it  has  not  saved 
us  nor  ours.     These  thoughts  deepen  in  the 
hearts  of  Christian  men;   they  are   in   the  air; 
the  age  is  favorable,  on  account  of  them,  to  new 
ideals  of  the  use  and  power  of  wealth.     We  go 


102  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

back,  therefore,  to  some  first  principles  of  our 
Christian  faith,  sobered,  matured,  and,  we 
believe,  chastened  in  heart  and  mind ;  for  we 
know  that  on  this  great  experiment  of  a  spirit- 
ual life  utilizing  the  physical  forces  of  wealth 
in  the  creation  of  a  new  social  order  rests  the 
hopes  of  mankind. 


X. 

SIMPLICITY  IN  LIVING. 

Under  the  general  subject  of  the  "New 
Ideal  of  Life"  as  manifested  in  the  Christian 
use  of  wealth,  let  us  proceed  to  illustrate  the 
largeness  and  sweep  of  the  thought. 

If  it  controls  us  only  at  odd  times,  in  our 
more  reflective  moments,  under  special  im- 
pulses, wrought  up  feelings,  and  in  hours  of 
worship;  but  is  not  comprehensive,  active, 
when  we  are  oblivious  of  the  motive  of  our 
action;  pulsing  through  life  like  our  heart's 
blood,  it  is  an  inadequate  remedy  for  the  evils 
we  desire  to  cure. 

It  remains  then  for  us  to  show  how  perva- 
sively, how  universally,  how  simply,  and  how 
naturally  it  will  act  throughout  all  our  life. 

One  of  the  happiest  and  most  helpful  re- 
sults of  such  an  ideal  would  be  in  the  return 
to  greater  simplicity  in  our  manner  of  living. 
This  is  entirely  different  from  the  ascetic  habit. 
Simplicity  is  not  exclusive  of  elegance,  but  of 
luxury.  Vulgar  people  spend  large  sums  to 
furnish  their  houses  in  imitation  of  the  fashion- 
103 


104  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

able  rich,  with  the  result  described  by  David 
Lyall  in  the  house  of  Ann  Laidlaw,  "  discrim- 
inating people  wondered  how  it  was  possible 
to  gather  so  much  that  was  hideous  and  costly 
in  one  place."  As  the  expensive  is  not  neces- 
sarily beautiful,  the  simple  is  not  necessarily 
ugly. 

An  elegant  simplicity  is  characteristic  of 
good  breeding,  gentle  manners,  and  old  family 
traditions.  It  may,  in  a  sort,  be  considered 
the  real  basis  of  gentility.  The  rich  parvenu 
thinks  otherwise,  and  makes  up  in  lavish  dis- 
play and  ostentatious  luxury  what  he  lacks 
in  family  portraits  and  fine  old  silver.  But 
the  real  gentleman  is  known  as  much  by  the 
simplicity  of  his  habits  as  by  the  castle  and  the 
crest. 

This  is  not  a  mere  fashion  but  a  principle  of 
life.  Its  tap  root  is  in  the  very  deepest  soil 
of  life.  It  concerns  what  a  man  eats,  drinks, 
wears,  surrounds  himself  with.  It  is  in  a 
manner  the  physical  basis  of  life — the  clothing 
of  his  soul.  It  is  eminently  personal  and  often 
presents  to  the  youth  the  first  battle-ground 
between  the  spirit  and  the  flesh.  From  the 
standpoint  of  taste  alone  some  people  choose  a 
simple  and  unostentatious  manner  of  life;  but 
if  we  are  to  insist  upon  it  as  a  principle  for  the 
guidance  of   Christian   society  we   must   show 


SIMPLICITY  IN  LIVING.  105 

that  it  is  other  and  greater  than  a  matter  of 
taste. 

What  spiritual  principle  is  involved?  This 
namely,  that  to  the  Christian  wealth,  on  its 
material  side  even,  is  sacred.  That  food,  drink, 
raiment,  furniture,  are  all  for  use,  not  gratifi- 
cation. That  they  have  a  sacred  ministry,  in- 
timately related  both  to  manners  and  to  morals. 
That  waste,  luxury,  intemperance,  display, 
selfish  excessive  expenditures  are  as  much  sins 
in  the  eye  of  God  as  dishonesty  and  lying. 
This  is  what  Jesus  indicated  when,  at  the 
close  of  the  miracle  of  feeding  the  multitude, 
he  said,  "Gather  up  the  fragments  that  remain 
that  nothing  be  lost."  The  material  basis  of 
life,  on  this  ground  alone,  is  sacred,  and  we  in- 
dicate in  this  close  personal  action  our  sense  of 
responsibility  for  its  use.  We  bring  those 
preeminently  personal  and  physical  functions 
of  life  and  social  habits  under  the  sway  of  a 
principle,  not  of  mere  self-denial  but  of  admin- 
istration. 

Assuredly  those  personal  habits  lie  at  the 
basis  of  all  morals,  all  gentlehood,  all  useful- 
ness. I  can  hardly  reconcile  the  thought  of  a 
Christian  man  being  a  gross  eater.  Yet  I  have 
known  many  such.  Of  Christian  people, 
lavish,  luxurious,  and  even  intemperate,  how 
are  we  to   speak?     It   is  largely  because  the 


106  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

divine  grace  of  simplicity  has  not  been  taught ; 
because  the  physical  basis  of  spirituality  has 
not  been  insisted  upon.  "Your  bodies,"  says 
the  Apostle,  "are  to  be  the  temple  of  the  Holy 
Ghost,"  they  are  to  be  washed  with  pure 
water.  Revelling  and  riotous  living  were  the 
characteristics  of  the  heathen :  simplicity  and 
sobriety  of  manners  were  to  be  the  marks  of 
Christians.  Nothing  said  here  should  be  con- 
strued as  finical  or  small  criticism  of  the 
minor  morals  and  refined  habits  of  life  either 
in  food,  dress,  or  equipage.  These  things 
may  be  elegant  and  choice,  and  yet  be  per- 
fectly consistent  with  this  principle  of  simpli- 
city. We  are  not  arguing  for  a  deal  table,  a 
sanded  floor,  and  unwashed  waiters. 

We  have  already  insisted  that  any  remedy 
for  conformity  to  the  world  which  implies  in- 
terference with  personal  liberty  in  the  ordering 
of  expenditures  is  as  vicious  as  it  is  vain.  The 
principle  of  simplicity  can  be  seen  illustrated 
alike  in  the  homes  of  the  great  and  the  hum- 
ble. One  feature  is  common  to  both :  a  cer- 
tain intelligence  and  refinement,  a  way  of  look- 
ing at  possessions  as  means  to  an  end,  and  a 
sense  of  responsibility  for  the  uses  to  which 
they  put  even  the  material  things  of  the  world. 
The  adoption  of  the  simple  aphorism,  that 
"we  eat  to  live  but  do  not  live  to  eat,"  would 


SIMPLICITY  IN  LIVING.  107 

save  many  of  us  from  deep  pitfalls  that  swal- 
low up  health  and  morals.  Simplicity  is  not 
only  consistent  with  dainty  habits  of  life,  it 
nourishes  and  cherishes  them  as  Christian 
graces.  These  are  a  sweet  and  gracious  fruit 
of  Christian  civilization  and  peculiarly  treasured 
by  cultured  women.  Refined  and  dainty  man- 
ners at  table  have  always  been  the  marks  of  a 
true  lady.  Chaucer,  in  his  sweet  picture  of 
the  Prioresse,  gives  this  note: 

"At  mete  was  she  wel  ytaughte  withalle; 
She  lette  no  morsel  from  her  lippes  falle." 

But  what  a  gross  inconsistency  that,  with 
such  clean  sweet  personal  habits,  women  should 
have  tolerated  the  Sybaritic  luxury,  and  the 
orgies  of  drinking  common  to  fashionable  so- 
ciety for  five  hundred  years.  We  have  noth- 
ing to  say  against  flowers,  crystal,  silver,  and 
spotless  damask,  pink  teas,  and  dainty  lunch- 
eons; nothing  to  say  against  banquets  of  State 
or  club  dinners;  for  this  is  not  a  plea  for  a 
sumptuary  law.  Our  claim  is  that  a  simple 
manner  of  life  is  consistent  with  gentlehood 
and  refinement,  that  it  fosters  instead  of  de- 
stroying them.  Our  contention  is  that  excess, 
intemperance,  luxury,  display,  is  not  only  vul- 
gar but  sinful ;  that  it  is  a  denial  of  the  sacred- 
ness   of   personal    bodily    functions,     and    an 


Io8  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

adoption,  at  the  very  basis  of  individual  con- 
duct, of  heathen  ideas  of  life. 

But  can  it  be  reasonably  maintained  that  the 
general  habits  of  Christians,  as  far  as  relate  to 
the  table,  dress,  furniture,  social  expenditures, 
and  amusements,  are  excessive,  often  actually 
intemperate,  and  entirely  quite  too  luxurious 
for  those  making  their  profession?  Let  it  be 
distinctly  understood  here  that  by  "their  pro- 
fession" is  not  meant  a  special  profession  of 
self-denial,  limitation,  and  renunciation  of  the 
"good  things"  of  this  life,  but  simply  a  pro- 
fession to  regard  the  spiritual  life  as  nobler 
than  the  life  of  the  flesh,  and  that  all  which 
goes  to  make  up  gentleness,  purity,  strength 
in  body  and  soul  is  their  sworn  friend,  and  all 
that  renders  them  vulgar,  selfish,  and  weak  is 
their  sworn  foe.  In  this  sense  it  can  be  said,  in 
all  charity,  that  our  present  Christian  society  is 
luxurious  and  excessive,  and  regards  the  pos- 
session of  wealth  as  a  means  to  personal  grati- 
fication rather  than  a  power  to  reach  a  higher 
life. 

The  condition  of  woman,  it  is  said,  is  the 
measure  of  any  civilization,  her  personal  habits 
the  best  test  of  social  refinement  anywhere,  but 
it  is  true  also  that  her  social  ambitions  are  the 
best  indications  of  the  prevalence  or  absence 
of  conformity  to  the  world.     It  is  to  satisfy 


SIMPLICITY  IN  LIVING.  109 

her  social  ambitions  that  many  men  in  business 
and  professional  life,  live  beyond  their  means 
and  scatter  both  fortune  and  life  in  the  pro- 
cess. Woman  is  a  creature  of  stronger  moral 
fiber,  of  purer  life,  of  greater  courage  in  the 
time  of  sickness  and  disaster  than  man.  But 
she  is  more  dependent  on  surroundings  when 
fortune  smiles.  Her  social  graces  thrive  best 
in  the  sunshine,  and  she  expands  and  rises  in 
conscious  power  when  wealth  sets  her  on  high. 

Thus  the  first  signs  of  growing  social  am- 
bitions appear  among  the  female  members  of 
the  family.  The  daughters  have  been  sent 
to  fashionable  schools,  they  have  had  a  little 
fortune  spent  upon  thern  for  music  and  other 
accomplishments.  They  must  now  have  some 
stage  worthy  of  their  powers,  natural  and 
acquired.  What  is  wealth  if  it  can  not  win 
social  recognition?  What  is  education  if  it  can 
not  secure  fashionable  friends?  What  is  busi- 
ness success  if  it  does  not  procure  a  social 
throne?  For  these  purposes,  with  the  attend- 
ant expenses  of  house,  carriage,  furniture, 
dress,  clubs,  and  sports,  the  great  body  of 
wealth  in  our  Christian  homes  is  lavished. 

Under  these  ideals  the  thought  of  respon- 
sibility and  sacred  use  of  wealth,  even  in  its 
bearing  on  their  own  life,  is  absent  or  unheeded. 
The  wealth  is  theirs ;  what  they  require  there- 


HO  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

fore  to  minister  to  their  own  appetites  or 
pride  or  ambition  appears  the  first  and  ex- 
clusive purpose  of  expenditure.  Its  use  for 
higher  ends  is  a  side  issue.  They  do  not  say 
"my  duty  is  to  be  educated,  refined,  accom- 
plished, useful,  for  the  purpose  of  illustrating  in 
my  own  life  the  beauty  and  nobleness  of 
Christ ;  for  the  purpose  of  making  my  home 
happy  and  a  centre  of  comfort  and  pleasure  to 
father,  mother,  and  friend."  They  do  not  see 
that  qualities  of  heart  and  head,  combined 
with  education  and  refinement,  are  not  only 
the  only  things  worth  having  in  themselves, 
but  are  passports  and  creators  of  all  the  best 
society. 

The  simplicity  which  characterizes  the  spir- 
itual nature  under  this  sense  of  obligation  is 
the  evidence  of  real  worth  and  the  ground  of 
social  recognition,  while  it  breaks  no  fortunes 
and  shortens  no  lives. 

The  luxury  and  extravagance  which  mark 
the  carnal  nature  and  selfish  liver  is  the  evi- 
dence of  pretense  and  the  precursor  of  social 
failure,  while  it  often  disrupts  business  and 
hastens  death. 

The  thoughtful  Christian  husband  and  wife 
must  consider  the  effect  of  an  ideal  like  this 
in  the  early  years  of  their  domestic  history. 
The  children   will  become  largely  what  they 


SIMPLICITY  IN  LIVING.  Ill 

are  habituated  to.  They  are  the  creatures 
of  atmosphere,  habitat,  and  example.  If 
they  find  evidences  of  a  refined  and  enlight- 
ened simplicity  in  the  home,  in  most  cases 
they  will  honor  it  by  imitation.  The  tradi- 
tions of  the  family  for  such  gentlehood  and 
simplicity  in  conduct  will  become  part  of  their 
heritage,  and  the  vices  of  a  materialistic  selfish 
life  will  be  repugnant  to  them.  Even  with 
the  utmost  care  in  education  and  the  most 
consistent  personal  example,  children  will 
sometimes  show  the  animal  traits  and  the  most 
selfish  disposition.  No  more  deadly  poison 
can  enter  the  blood  of  a  child  than  the  selfish- 
ness which  leads  him  to  regard  the  parents' 
wealth  as  a  fortunate  chance  for  his  own  indul- 
gence or  ambition.  This  is  that  evil  which  has 
its  ripe  fruit  in  the  "post-obits"  of  fashionable 
young  roues,  and  the  deep  dishonor  of  wait- 
ing for  the  old  man's  death.  It  is  a  sure  sign 
of  a  corrupt  society,  and  has  been  rightly  re- 
garded by  observers  of  manners  like  Thackeray 
as  the  final  dishonor  of  an  abandoned  life. 

One  other  consideration  affects  the  conduct 
of  the  more  thoughtful  people  to-day  in  the 
manner  of  their  living.  It  is  the  contrast  pre- 
sented by  the  abundant  and  luxurious  tables 
of  the  wealthy,  and  the  hunger  and  destitution 
in   many  homes  of  the   poor.      It  is  no  suflfi- 


112  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

cient  answer  to  say  that  much  of  this  is  due 
to  vice  on  the  part  of  the  poor  themselves, 
misfortunes  or  economic  conditions  over  which 
the  rich  have,  as  individuals,  no  control.  Nor 
is  it  material  to  say  that  much  of  the  expendi- 
ture of  the  rich  in  dress,  table,  and  equipage, 
goes  to  benefit  trade.  The  truth  is,  that  be- 
hind economic  considerations  is  the  fact  of  a 
common  humanity,  and  when  large  classes  of 
people  go  hungry  and  naked,  no  man  of  fine 
feelings  will  banquet  to  surfeit,  or  dress  like 
Beau  Brummell.  The  action  too  strongly  re- 
sembles the  parable  of  the  rich  man  and  Laz- 
arus. 

The  Christian  man,  especially,  will  recog- 
nize this  as  a  matter  of  spiritual  discretion. 
He  is  forced  by  his  better  nature  to  find  a 
principle  of  action  which,  without  involving 
his  domestic  and  business  life  in  the  evils  of 
communism  or  indiscriminate  charity,  will  at 
least  save  him  from  the  charge  of  a  heartless 
disregard  of  the  sufferings  of  the  unfortunate. 
He  instinctively  perceives  that  simplicity  in 
eating  and  dressing  are  the  first  marks  of  such 
sympathy,  and  the  people  will  perceive  that 
the  man  who  can  so  order  his  life  has  laid  hold 
of  a  principle  dealing  with  the  use  of  wealth 
which  renders  him  a  promoter  of  general  well 
being. 


SIMPLICITY  IN  LIVING.  113 

In  view  of  the  newer  political  economy,  it 
is  true  that  a  thrift  and  simplicity  which  re- 
sults in  hoarding,  and  limiting  of  proper  ex- 
penditures for  the  table,  clothing,  and  furni- 
ture, are  a  great  disaster  both  to  the  rich  and 
poor.  But  the  cultured,  responsible  Christian 
man  who  has  adopted  the  rule  of  simplicity 
will  never  commit  this  mistake.  In  his  house 
no  domestic  will  ever  need  to  complain  of  the 
"long  prayers  and  short  suppers."  His  char- 
acter can  never  be  summed  up  in  the  pithy 
proverb,  "greedy  as  godly."  He  will  be  a 
man  to  whom  the  simplicity  of  Jesus  has  be- 
come real  and  the  spiritual  uses  of  material 
things  has  been  revealed — one  to  whom  life, 
on  its  physical  side  even,  furnishes  the  vantage 
ground  of  high  character  and  great  usefulness. 
"Plain  living  and  high  thinking"  will  not 
mean  sordid  ways  and  an  excuse  for  avarice, 
but  a  larger,  purer  family  and  personal  ideal 
of  life,  and  opportunity  for  spiritual  influence. 
A  knowledge  of  the  ministry  of  things,  a  mas- 
tery over  the  qualities  of  things,  and  a  divine 
purpose  in  the  use  of  things,  are  what  may  be 
hoped  for  from  the  simpler  manner  of  life. 
Nearer  the  heart  of  Jesus,  nearer  the  throb- 
bing pulse  of  humanity,  nearer  the  beauty  of 
nature  we  get,  the  simpler  we  become  in  our 
manner  of  living. 


XI. 

EDUCATION  AND  FAMILY  TRAINING. 

The  family  (the  true  integer  of  society),  the 
power  of  heredity,  the  influence  of  family  tra- 
ditions, and  the  promise  of  God  to  bless  our 
children,  should  be  the  four-square  foundation 
on  which  to  build  Christian  society  to-day. 

Christians  commence  family  life  with  gra- 
cious and  unselfish  feelings  in  their  own  hearts, 
which  they  never  dream  of  organizing  into 
principles  of  family  education.  And  they  are 
surprised  and  disappointed  when  the  chil- 
dren refuse  to  accept  the  spiritual  ideals  of 
life  and  the  unselfish  service  of  humanity 
which  warmed  their  own  hearts  when  young. 
We  train  our  children  for  the  professions  with 
elaborate  care  on  lines  which  long  experience 
have  proved  perfectly  adapted  for  the  end  in 
view.  We  leave  the  ideal  of  life  largely  to 
chance. 

These    two  thousand  years  of    a  Christian 

gospel   have   not   yet  yielded   us  a  science  of 

family  training  and  Christian  education  fitted 

to  impress  our  own  children  with  the  preemi- 

n4 


EDUCATION  AND  FAMILY   TRAINING.    115 

nent  superiority  of  the  spiritual  ideal  and  prac- 
tical method  of  life  possessed  by  the  Founder 
of  our  Faith.  We  have  not  seriously  thought 
Christian  education  and  family  training  with 
such  ends  in  view  possible. 

Accordingly  the  spiritual  force  which  we 
gain  in  one  generation  we  lose  in  another.  We 
do  not  think  it  strange,  even,  that  the  child 
of  devout  parents  should  "cast  in  his  lot 
with  the  evildoers."  Mrs.  Humphrey  Ward, 
in  her  latest  delineation  of  English  society, 
makes  the  only  son  of  a  tender,  spiritual, 
devotee  mother  a  rake  and  rebel  against  all 
law  and  decency.  In  religion  we  have  almost 
altogether  elected  to  fight  the  battle  against 
the  world,  the  flesh,  and  the  devil  without  the 
aid  of  the  hereditary  principle  and  forgetting 
the  divine  promise  concerning  training  and 
education.  We  have  handed  over  these  forces 
to  the  enemy,  and  he  has  used  them  with  cruel 
thoroughness  against  our  dearest  interests. 

Our  openly  avowed  purpose  in  education 
has  been  to  obtain  for  our  children  a  good 
settlement  in  life.  A  "good  settlement"  has 
come  to  mean  almost  exclusively  a  "good 
financial  settlement."  Education  has  been 
controlled  almost  entirely  by  this  idea;  train- 
ing in  the  home,  when  given  at  all,  has  been 
toward  this  object.      And  now  we  are  surprised 


Il6  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

and  chagrined  that  our  children  are  more  ma- 
terialistic than  we  are  ourselves. 

The  recipients  of  our  hero-worship,  whom 
we  have  belauded  in  orations,  held  up  as  ex- 
amples in  the  pulpits,  mentioned  with  rev- 
erence at  our  own  tables,  and  praised  in  biog- 
raphies are  millionaires  and  boss  politicians. 
''Business  success,"  ''getting  on,"  "making 
money,"  are  the  characteristic  phrases  of  our 
nineteenth  century  civilization. 

Our  youth  want  to  "get  through"  college, 
they  do  not  want  to  be  educated.  In  some 
cases,  in  our  great  cities,  where  the  fever  has 
entered  the  blood  with  greatest  virulence,  sons 
and  daughters  of  wealthy  Christian  parents 
have  less  regard  for  a  university  training  than 
the  children  of  European  peasants.  Even 
those  who  do  go  to  college  are  consumed 
with  eagerness  to  get  done  with  their  studies 
that  they  may  go  to  money  making.  This  is 
eating  our  corn  in  the  green  ear — poisoning 
the  very  fountain  of  the  intellectual  life  at  its 
source.  Even  for  the  purpose  of  wealth  pro- 
duction this  is  suicidal,  while  for  the  ends  of 
a  higher  civilization  and  a  spiritual  ideal  of  life 
it  is  altogether  fatal. 

Something  vital  is  wanting  here.  Evidently 
the  absence  of  correct  and  systematic  instruc- 
tion by  parents  concerning  the  use  of  wealth. 


EDUCATION  AND  FAMILY   TRAINING.    117 

What  is  society  the  better  for  the  finan- 
cial success  of  this  man  if  his  wealth  is  to 
be  made  only  a  vantage  ground  for  a  suc- 
ceeding generation  of  grasping,  materialistic 
children?  The  first  effect  of  easy  circum- 
stances in  any  home  should  be  relief  from 
anxiety  about  the  world.  It  should  mean  to 
the  children  the  direction  of  the  mind  and 
heart,  without  distraction,  to  the  mental  and 
spiritual  equipment  of  life,  so  that  when  their 
call  to  public  duty  comes  the  state  and  church 
should  get  their  best. 

It  is  by  the  operation  of  this  principle  that 
the  artist,  scientist,  and  literary  worker  is  re- 
lieved, either  by  private  munificence  or  pub- 
lic endowment,  from  productive  toil  in  the 
early  period  of  his  life,  and  trained  to  the  ex- 
ercise of  his  highest  powers.  But  the  youth 
with  the  materialistic  conception  of  life  re- 
nounces his  advantages,  "sells  his  birthright 
for  a  mess  of  pottage,"  and  the  second  gener- 
ation of  Christians  lose  all  their  spiritual  ad- 
vantages from  the  rise  in  life  won  by  their 
parents.  Indeed,  they  have  deteriorated ;  for 
the  money  of  the  first  generation  was  tempered 
by  the  warm  impulses  and  kindly  faith  of  the 
parents  and  some  restraint  of  a  spiritual  kind 
was  placed  upon  its  use.  But  in  the  hands  of 
the  second  generation,  which  has  rejected  the 


nS  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

spiritual  ideal  of  its  fathers,  and  appreciates 
only  the  base  residue  of  their  worldly  success, 
money  becomes  an  engine  of  evil,  destructive 
of  the  best  in  the  man  and  in  society. 

A  clear  grasp  of  these  moral  uses  of  wealth, 
as   related    to    the  training   and    education   of 
children,  would  greatly  help  to  solve  this  prob- 
lem  of   conformity  to  the   world  in  our  very 
homes.       Christian    parents    must    be    led    to 
see  that  the  power  of  money  in  certain  most 
vital    directions    is    limited.     They    must    be 
taught    anew    the    meaning    of    our    Savior's 
words,    "a    man's    life    consisteth   not   in   the 
abundance  of  the  things  which  he  possesseth." 
The   main  purpose  of   wealth  is  to  educate 
and   equip   the  young  people  for   service.      If 
they   are    so    educated    and    so    trained    that 
all  the  powers  of  mind  and  heart  are  in  normal, 
healthy   action,  they  are   on   the  high  road  to 
success.      Success  is  not  a  return  upon  the  old 
road  the  parents  have  gone,  and  added  wealth 
is  not  the  only  end  for  an  educated  Christian 
youth.     The    very    possession    of    wealth    by 
parents  should  be  a  divine  call  to  the  children 
for   a   different   kind   of   service.     They   have 
thus  become,  as  it  were,  hostages  to  God  for 
the  execution  of  a  high  treaty  in  the  interests 
of  a  more   spiritual  and  enlightened  life  and 
a  larger  service  for  the  needy  and  unfortunate. 


EDUCATION  AND  FAMILY   TRAINING.    no. 

Educational  life  at  school  and  college  must 
be  regarded  with  greater  pleasure  and  inter- 
est by  the  students.  It  is  at  present  regarded 
too  often  as  a  time  of  restraint  and  depri- 
vation. This  fever  of  materialism  must  be 
got  out  of  the  blood  of  our  youth,  and  the 
calmness,  repose,  elevation  of  manner,  and 
love  of  study  for  its  own  sake,  which  belong 
to  the  healthy  blood  of  noble  youth,  be  in- 
jected in  its  place.  Children  must  be  taught 
that  under  no  normal  conditions  of  life,  if  they 
will  only  look  at  education  from  the  right 
viewing  point,  will  they  ever  be  so  happy  and 
so  honorable  as  when  students.  They  must 
be  taught  the  secret  of  enjoying  the  present, 
carpe  diem  with  a  new  significance. 

It  is  not  because  my  boy  may  be  a  great 
statesman  or  a  successful  merchant  that  I  love 
him,  nor  because  my  daughter  may  marry  a 
millionaire  that  I  love  her.  I  love  them  for 
themselves,  not  for  what  they  may  achieve  or 
obtain  in  the  future.  I  am  in  no  hurry  to  see 
them  graduate.  My  money,  won  by  honest 
toil,  is  now  being  used  for  a  divine  purpose 
in  their  education.  This  is,  in  itself,  if  not  an 
ultimate  fact,  yet  quite  ultimate  enough  to 
mark  an  era  in  life  and  produce  enjoyment. 
Why  should  they  not  look  at  the  wealth  of 
their  home  in  the  same  way? 


120  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

When  fitly  educated,  it  is  quite  possible — 
in  many  cases  very  desirable — that  the  boy 
should  follow  his  father's  business  or  pro- 
fessional career.  It  is  possible,  also,  that  a 
prolonged  university  training  may  not  be 
necessary  or  desirable.  This  does  not  in  any 
way  alter  the  ideas  concerning  the  use  of  wealth 
which  such  a  boy  ought  to  be  taught.  An 
education  fitted  to  his  calling  and  genius  is  the 
best  for  him.  His  business  may  be  as  much 
a  trust  as  the  artistic  gift.  His  professional 
service  may  be  as  much  a  consecration  of  his 
energies  as  if  he  went  forth  to  minister  in  a 
foreign  land. 

But  if  no  such  lofty  ideas  of  responsibility 
come  to  the  children  of  wealthy  homes,  they 
are  in  a  worse  condition,  as  far  as  the  spir- 
itual objects  of  life  are  concerned,  than  their 
parents.  Life  with  them  has  entered  the 
weary,  dreary,  monotony  of  materialism. 
"They  make  money  to  buy  land  to  feed  hogs, 
to  make  more  money  to  buy  more  land  to  feed 
more  hogs,  to  make  still  more  money,"  and 
so  on  ad  infinitum^  till  existence  is  a  burden 
and  life  is  shorn  of  its  glory. 

Worldly  conformity  has  no  more  constant 
stream  feeding  its  bitter  waters  than  the  ma- 
terialism of  the  children  of  well-to-do  parents. 
This  supply  is  constant,  partly  because  of  the 


EDUCATION  AND  FAMILY   TRAINING.   1 21 

ignorance,  partly  because  of  the  folly  of  Chris- 
tian people.  When  we  forget  our  own  early 
ideals,  our  faith  and  hope  of  larger  service  for 
Christ  and  men,  in  the  vanity  of  later  success, 
the  children  born  into  our  homes  can  see  the 
present  selfishness  and  worldly  manners — they 
ctin  not  perceive  the  original  impulses.  This 
is  our  folly.  We  expect  them  to  take  up  into 
their  life  ideas  to  which  we  attained  by  sweat 
and  blood.  We  forget  that  our  success  has 
rendered  them  susceptible  to  new  influences 
and-  instruction ;  but  we  do  not  know  how  to 
teach  and  apply  the  new  forces.  This  is  our 
ignorance. 

Social  Christianity  was  certainly  intended 
to  grow  stronger  and  purer  as  the  sons  and 
daughters  of  men  of  faith  grew  up  in  the  shel- 
ter and  culture  of  refined  and  educated  homes. 
It  has  failed  to  do  so,  largely  because  Christian 
parents  have  not  found  in  wealth  its  spiritual 
ministry  and  have  not  made  it  a  condition  of 
nobler  service.  As  princes  are  educated  to 
duties  of  state,  Christian  children  should  be 
educated  to  the  service  of  the  people.  No 
prince  would  consider  it  a  privilege  to  make 
money,  because  he  has  all  that  money  can 
bring  The  children  of  wealthy  Christian 
homes  have  all  that  money  can  bring.  Would 
they  but   recognize    its    responsibilities,   they 


122  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

would  add  the  princely  dignity  of  service  also 
to  their  life. 

When,  therefore,  they  are  fully  prepared 
for  the  work  of  their  life,  under  the  direction 
of  this  new  ideal  they  will  enter  it  with  a  wide 
outlook,  with  a  real  knowledge  of  the  value  of 
money,  with  a  spiritual  purpose,  and  with  a 
just  regard  to  the  claims  of  society  upon  their 
service  as  privileged  and  fortunate  persons. 

Such  ideals  and  ambitions  will  increase  their 
productive  energies,  not  only  in  business,  but 
in  art,  science,  and  literature,  while  it  will 
enormously  increase  their  fitness  and  willing- 
ness for  all  forms  of  philanthropic  service.  In 
a  generation  or  two  this  would  yield  us  a  class 
of  spendidly  equipped,  public  spirited  citizens, 
and  noble,  devoted  workers  for  the  church. 

The  results  of  such  training  will  tell  also 
upon  the  preeminently  vital  subject  of  per- 
sonal service,  which  the  conscience  of  the  time 
is  demanding  of  all  truly  earnest  souls. 


XII. 

PERSONAL  SERVICE  A  PRIVILEGE  OF 
WEALTH. 

The  note  of  the  new  philanthropy  is  per- 
sonal service.  Rich  people  have,  almost  en- 
tirely, hitherto,  done  such  work,  by  proxy. 
In  fashionable  society  "Marcella"  is  an  oddity 
because  she  went  to  live  among  the  people  of 
the  East  End  of  London,  and  thus  learn  by 
actual  contact,  and  by  personal  friendship  and 
fellow-suffering,  the  real  condition  and  thoughts 
of  the  working-classes. 

Conventional  Christians  whose  hearts  have 
not  felt  the  throb  of  the  new  movement  can 
not  understand  this  "latest  fad"  on  the  part 
of  their  "peculiar"  acquaintances  and  friends. 
It  is  totally  unlike  the  ministry  for  the  church 
poor,  where  old  women  and  sick  people  were 
visited  by  the  parson  and  the  good  ladies  of 
the  parish,  and  were  given  blankets  and 
provisions.  Such  kindly  personal  service  to 
parish  neighbors  and  fellow-members  of  the 
church  has  always  prevailed  among  charitable 
and  generous  Christians.  The  idea  of  a 
123 


124  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

brotherhood  of  humanity  which  could  be 
helped  only  by  love  and  sympathy  shown  by 
the  rich,  cultured,  and  strong  for  the  weak, 
poor,  and  ignorant  has  overgrown  the  church- 
wall,  and  is  shedding  its  fragrance  in  the  great 
field   of  the  world. 

This  divine  impulse  to  personal  social  ser- 
vice lies  at  the  heart,  and  surrounds,  like  an 
atmosphere,  the  whole  of  the  new  effort  to 
help  men  known  as  "the  Social  Settlement 
Movement."  It  came  from  the  heart  and 
brain  of  a  cultured  student  of  Oxford,  Arnold 
Toynbee,  and  it  has  found  its  warmest  sup- 
porters among  the  privileged  class  to  which 
he  belonged. 

Since  Toynbee  Hall  settlement  was  estab- 
lished in  1885,  Miss  Lathrop,  of  Hull  House, 
Chicago,  informs  us  that  "about  seventy-five 
small  groups  of  people  have  made  their  homes 
in  the  most  arid  and  crowded  parts  of  various 
English  and  American  cities,  to  lend  a  hand 
toward  improving  their  neighborhoods  and 
toward  gaining  a  little  exact  knowledge  of 
social  conditions."  All  settlements  since  then 
have  been  inspired  and  moulded  by  the  exam- 
ple of  Toynbee  Hall,  which  was  erected  to 
perpetuate  the  memory  of  this  devoted  young 
Oxfordian.  "After  his  untimely  death  his 
friends   determined   to   build  a  house  in  East 


PERSONAL    SERVICE.  1 25 

London  where  University  men  might  live 
"face  to  face  with  the  actual  conditions  of 
crowded  city  life,  study  on  the  spot  the  evils 
and  their  remedies,  and,  if  possible,  ennoble 
the  lives  and  improve  the  material  conditions 
of    the    people." 

These  social  experiences  have  taught  "all 
scientific  reformers  and  apostles  of  light  that 
the  truth  and  beauty  of  goodness  have  to  be 
lived  out  among  the  people  to  be  understood." 
The  social  settlement  to-day  therefore  stands 
for  a  new  method  of  social  regeneration. 

"It  is  a  social,  moral,  and  intellectual  clear- 
ing house  and  agency,  where  you  can  find  and 
feel  the  social  equivalent  of  any  doctrine,  new 
or  old,  of  any  practical  or  theoretical  princi- 
ple, new  or  old."  It  has  been  defined  as  "a 
group  of  educated  men  or  women  (or  both) 
living  among  manual  workers  in  a  neighborly 
and  social  spirit."  "Organized  work  is  not 
essential  but  is  a  convenient  method  of  getting 
acquainted.  Nothing  is  essential  except  resi- 
dence and  a  spirit  of  brotherhood  expressed 
actively." 

Dr.  Caldwell  has  justly  laid  special  em- 
phasis upon  the  fact  that  "these  settlements 
have  come  ultimately  from  the  Universities." 
"It  means  that  they  are  founded,  not  only  on 
ideas  and  knowledge,  but  upon  personalities — 


126  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

upon  the  personalities  of  some  of  the  finest 
kind  of  men  that  are  produced  in  Great 
Britain."  This  element  of  personality  has 
always  attracted  the  strongest  class  of  think- 
ers, "who  are  more  willing  to  enter  upon  the 
work  of  the  education  and  elevation  of  hu- 
manity, and  thereby  of  themselves,  than  upon 
any  other  kind  of  service." 

Thus  in  this  movement  the  social  and 
spiritual  needs  of  the  workers  themselves  have 
always  been  kept  in  view.  They  entered 
this  work  not  in  any  spirit  of  condescension, 
and  not  solely  with  the  intention  of  bestowing 
favors,  but  for  the  purpose  of  learning  the  real 
facts  about  life,  and  keeping  their  own  hearts 
and  minds  in  a  healthy  social  balance.  "They 
were  to  carry  with  them  the  habits  and  cus- 
toms of  culture,  and  by  settling  in  congested 
districts  to  devote  themselves  to  the  work  of 
common  self-improvement  and  common  eleva- 
tion." 

This  characteristic  feature  of  the  work 
makes  it  an  important  contribution  to  the  sub- 
ject before  us.  It  is  not  a  mere  gift,  not  a 
surrender  of  privilege,  not  a  denial  of  posses- 
sions, but  a  use  of  gifts,  privileges,  and  pos- 
sessions, under  the  direction  of  a  spirit  of 
brotherhood  for  a  common  benefit.  It  is  a 
leveling  up  of  society  to  the  highest  altitudes 


PERSONAL   SERVICE.  127 

of  privilege,  by  the  insistence  of  individual 
talents,  tastes,  and  possessions. 

We  thus  discover  that  the  best  service  a 
man  can  render  this  community  among  which 
he  has  cast  his  lot,  for  the  time  being  at  least, 
is  to  be  and  possess  something  of  value. 
Unless  he  is  educated  and  refined  he  is  of  little 
use  among  the  unlettered  and  vulgar.  If  he 
is  a  professional  man — as  physician,  lawyer, 
or  teacher — all  the  better.  If  he  is  a  man  of 
means  and  leisure,  better  still.  "Each  man 
has  much  to  learn  and  much  to  teach.  No 
rules  limit  his  action  as  an  individual."  The 
movement  not  only  gives  but  demands  free 
play  for  all  personal  powers  and  all  personal 
possessions.  It  requires  a  rich,  full  life  on  one 
side  of  the  social  and  intellectual  scale  to  make 
this  personal  service,  and  to  such  a  life  it  re- 
turns a  thousand-fold  in  largeness  of  experi- 
ence, in  strength  of  character,  and  in  simplicity 
of  faith. 

Wealthy  Christian  parents  are  under  obliga- 
tion to  examine  this  social  settlement  move- 
ment, not  simply  as  a  method  of  reformation 
for  the  submerged  classes,  but  as  a  solution  of 
the  problem  of  self-indulgence  which  corrupts 
the  moral  and  intellectual  fiber  of  their  own 
families.  If  they  are  seeking  a  principle  of 
education  in  their  civic  and  social   duties,    if 


128  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

they  are  looking  for  a  sane  method  of  human 
helpfulness,  it  is  to  be  found  here. 

We  do  not  say  that  every  youth  in  every 
household  of  wealth  must  necessarily  perform 
this  service,  but  it  is  meant  that  along  these 
lines  of  personal  service  are  the  experiences 
and  incentives  to  a  nobler  life  which  is  to  save 
the  youth  born  to  means  and  privileges  from 
sinking  back  into  an  unpatriotic  and  unchris- 
tian self-indulgence.  Every  age  has  its  special 
problems  and  lessons;  the  youth  who  does  not 
learn  the  lesson  of  his  age  and  accept  the  ser- 
vice of  his  time  is  a  degenerate.  He  not  only 
fails  in  his  own  proper  development,  but  he 
also  deprives  some  other  person  or  class  of  the 
succor  which  his  talents  and  experience  were 
intended  to  furnish  the  common  good.  The 
special  lesson  of  our  time  is,  that,  for  their 
own  sakes,  people  of  means  and  leisure  must 
serve  in  their  own  proper  persons  the  im- 
poverished and  the  ignorant. 

Thus,  then,  the  problems  of  poverty,  over- 
crowding, drink,  idleness,  municipal  corrup- 
tion, and  practical  atheism,  which  have  be- 
come the  disgrace  and  menace  of  our  modern 
city  life,  have  been  attacked  by  the  student 
and  the  lover  of  humanity.  It  is  a  somewhat 
singular  fact  in  our  modern  social  life  that 
practical  men,  so-called,  have  so  largely  kept 


PERSONAL   SERVICE.  129 

aloof  from  this  work.  Philanthropists,  ideal- 
ists, recluses,  cultured  and  refined  women,  stu- 
dents of  social  conditions — lookers-on,  hitherto, 
of  the  great  drama  of  life — have  seen  the  horrid 
mass  of  pauperism  increase  and  the  breach 
widen  between  rich  and  poor,  and  they  have 
at  last  stepped  down  to  minister.  They  have 
gone  back  to  a  direct  imitation  of  Jesus.  They 
have  reached  the  heart  of  the  trouble.  They 
have  manifested  the  divinity  of  unconscious 
power,  as  when  a  child,  simply  because  it 
loves  both  parties,  will  effect  a  reconciliation 
by  taking  both  the  disputants  by  the  hand. 

The  personal  service  of  those  cultured 
strong  men  and  women  is  the  link  to  bind  rich 
and  poor  together  in  the  redeemed  order  of 
society.  What  the  poor  and  unfortunate  want 
is  not  money,  but  brotherhood.  What  the 
ignorant,  unpatriotic,  selfish  man  needs  is  the 
example  of  a  wise,  patriotic,  self-sacrificing 
life,  lived  in  a  place  where  he  can  see  it  is  gen- 
uine. 

What  our  individual  use  of  wealth  had 
largely  brought  about  was  separation,  more 
final  and  hopeless  than  Hindu  caste.  Our 
scholars,  statesmen,  men  of  letters,  profes- 
sional workers,  and  business  men,  who  might 
be  said  to  carry  the  wealth  of  civilization  in 
the   shape   of  brains,  experience,  and  culture, 


130  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

had  become  a  separate  class.  They  seldom 
or  never  came  into  contact  with  workingmen. 

Two  castes  have  grown  up  in  a  nominal 
democracy.  They  differ  not  only  in  material 
possessions,  but  in  ways  of  looking  at  life,  in 
habits  of  thought,  and  principles  of  action. 
They  need  one  another.  The  poor  and  igno- 
rant citizen  has  a  ministry  for  the  rich  and 
educated.  But  the  rich  man  often  thought 
his  obligation  was  discharged  by  a  dole  which 
the  poor  man  returned  with  a  curse. 

Polite  learning,  also,  in  Universities  had 
become  a  recluse.  Schools  originally  in- 
tended for  the  poor  became  the  rich  man's 
perquisite.  It  became  luxurious,  dilletante, 
and  contemptuous  of  the  profanum  vulgiis. 
In  Democratic  America,  and  even  in  Demo- 
cratic monarchies,  like  Great  Britain,  this  was 
the  direst  of  political  misfortunes.  Political 
economy,  health  conditions,  and  all  those  sub- 
jects which  enter  into  a  proper  understanding 
of  wages,  wealth  production,  and  national 
wellbeing,  became  the  exclusive  possession  of 
one  class.  And  the  class  which  needed  them 
most,  as  the  basis  of  their  prosperity,  were  left 
to  flounder  in  the  mire  of  ignorance,  or  be 
led  into  the  bogs  of  fanaticism  by  demagogic 
1 '  will-o '  -the-wisps. 

Women    of    leisure,    education,    and  refine- 


PERSONAL   SERVICE.  131 

ment  gave  themselves  so  entirely  to  fashion 
and  self-indulgence  amid  the  luxuries  and  ele- 
gance of  their  homes,  and  to  amusements, 
sports,  and  intellectual  pursuits,  that  the  gra- 
cious ministry  of  gentle  womanhood  was  all 
but  forgotten  in  the  homes  of  the  needy. 
Many  of  the  bitterest  personal  sorrows  and 
social  sufferings  connected  with  wifehood  and 
motherhood  can  be  understood  and  succored 
only  by  a  wise  and  loving  woman.  Women 
with  leisure  and  ability  for  this  service  were 
engaged  in  balls,  routs,  theatres,  and  house- 
parties,  or  indisposed  on  account  of  the  social 
strain.  The  personal  privileges  of  wealth  had, 
in  nominally  Christian  society,  all  but  driven 
out  the  sense  of  its  personal  responsibility. 
Where  the  strain  of  the  social  system  was 
greatest  the  help  was  feeblest  or  useless.  The 
two  classes,  separate  and  frowning,  faced  one 
another,  as  friends  who  have  quarreled — they 
stood  apart  'Mike  rocks  that  have  been  rent 
asunder."  How  are  these  now  hard,  unyield- 
ing substances  to  be  once  more  fused  into  a 
common  nationality  and  common  brotherhood? 
Only  by  the  power  of  love  through  personal 
service.  A  right  idea  of  the  use  of  wealth  in 
our  Christian  families  will  enable  us  to  raise 
up  a  generation  which  will  regard  social  service 
as  a  prince  regards  his  heritage  of  government. 


132  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

Towards  this  personal  service  the  youth  will 
look  with  interest  and  enthusiasm.  This  will 
be  his  kingdom,  his  privilege,  his  heritage,  as 
well  as  his  patriotic  and  Christian  obligation. 
An  Armenian  princess,  recently  graduated  M. 
D.  from  Berne.  She  has  since  served  in  the 
cholera  hospitals  of  Russia,  and  done  so  much 
good  as  to  receive  the  personal  thanks  of  the 
Tsar.  She  is  now  practicing  medicine  at  her 
father's  palace,  where  sick  people  for  miles 
around  flock  to  consult  her,  and  she  is  devoting 
a  large  part  of  her  fortune  to  erecting  an  hos- 
pital to  enlarge  her  work. 

Without  the  possession  of  accumulated 
wealth,  and  consequent  education  and  equip- 
ment, such  action  would  be  impossible.  With 
the  means,  and  such  a  wise  use  of  it,  through 
a  rich,  gracious  personality,  its  power  to  cor- 
rupt the  spirit  of  the  possessor  is  destroyed 
and  its  ability  to  save  and  bless  the  people  is 
demonstrated.  It  ought  to  be  enough  to  say, 
that  no  condition  of  life  can  be  so  near  an  im- 
itation of  the  action  of  Jesus  and  no  use  of 
money  so  transmute  the  privileges  of  material 
possessions  into  the  immortal  treasures  of  the 
soul. 


XIII. 

PERSONAL  SERVICE  A  CAREER  OF 
DISTINCTION. 

A  prominent  public  man  not  long  since  de- 
clared that  the  hour  had  come  for  the  sons  of 
rich  men  in  America  to  give  themselves,  after 
proper  equipment,  to  the  public  service  simply 
for  the  honor  and  opportunity  of  doing  a 
patriotic  work.  This  is  a  most  hopeful  sign 
of  the  times  so  far  as  municipal  and  national 
progress  is  concerned.  It  has  always  been 
considered  the  most  honorable,  as  it  has  proved 
the  most  glorious,  phase  of  the  history  of  peo- 
ple of  rank  in  Europe  to  be  able  to  serve  their 
country.  We  need  apprehend  no  danger  from 
an  aristocratic,  exclusive,  governing  class  in 
such  a  course  of  action.  Our  society  changes 
too  often  for  that.  Indeed,  the  real  danger 
from  these  changes  is  that  we  may  get,  not  a 
government  by  the  "best,"  but  a  government 
by  the  "worst." 

The  possession  of  wealth  is  preeminently 
a  prima  facie  obligation  to  serve  the  State 
and  Nation.  Instead  of  progressing  upon  the 
i33 


134  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

sentiments  of  the  classic  republics  of  the  past 
in  this  patriotic  obligation,  we  are  shamelessly 
behind  them.  Our  rich  citizens  are  more 
anxious  that  their  sons  should  continue  to 
trade  and  accumulate  wealth  than  they  are  to 
see  them  serve  the  City  or  the  State  as  diplo- 
mats and  statesmen. 

There  is  only  one  worse  sign, — the  sons  too 
often  agree  with  the  fathers  in  this.  In  the 
times  when  the  free  cities  of  Europe  were  the 
defenders  of  liberty,  and  when  Venice  and 
Genoa  were  in  their  glory,  it  was  considered 
an  honor  for  a  merchant  to  serve  his  native 
town  as  alderman,  mayor,  provost,  counselor, 
or  doge.  Then  wealth  carried  with  it  an  ob- 
ligation of  patriotism.  It  was  more  honorable 
to  be  a  servant  of  the  people  than  greatly 
to  increase  the  family  fortune.  There  can  be 
little  hope  for  our  Nation  till  this  same  spirit 
revives  in  the  hearts  of  men  who  are  born  to 
wealth  and  privilege. 

To  the  enlightened  Christian  and  patriot 
this  should  be  a  specially  attractive  field  of 
action  for  the  advancement  of  the  Kingdom 
of  Christ.  To  give  a  son  at  the  call  of  the 
Nation  for  the  defense  of  her  honor  in  the 
trying  days  of  sixty-one,  has  always  been  re- 
garded by  loyal  Americans  as  the  greatest 
proof   of  love  of  country.      But  the  virtue  of 


PERSONAL   SERVICE.  135 

enlightened  patriotism  is  as  much  needed  in 
the  time  of  peace  as  in  the  time  of  war.  More 
indeed  on  the  part  of  the  wealthy,  for  then  the 
vices  of  luxury  and  materialism  are  more  likely 
to  fasten  on  their  life.  The  Christian  man 
who  so  regards  his  wealth  as  an  opportunity  to 
train  and  equip  a  loyal  youth  for  the  service  of 
his  country  has  made  the  best  possible  use  of 
his  fortune,  and  vindicated  the  higher  ministry 
of  wealth.  The  youth  who  appropriates  this 
ideal  of  service  and  accepts  this  obligation, 
arising  out  of  his  education  and  fortune,  has 
proved  himself  the  best  representative  of  the 
men  of  "  '76"  and  "  '61." 

There  is  in  America  to-day  a  noble 
opportunity  for  this  service  also  in  the  work  of 
education.  The  highly  educated  and  richly 
equipped  sons  and  daughters  of  our  families  of 
wealth  are  sorely  needed  in  the  poor  and  ill- 
furnished  colleges  of  the  West  as  instructors, 
professors,  and  presidents.  Literature  and 
scientific  work  have  always  been  a  favorite 
pursuit  with  men  of  leisure  and  fortune.  It  is 
within  our  knowledge  that  many  men  whose 
fathers  are  engaged  in  commercial  pursuits 
have  turned  aside  from  the  allurements  of  busi- 
ness to  original  scientific  investigation,  possible 
only  to  those  who  can  command  means  and 
leisure.     But  the  opportunity  for  young  men 


136  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

and  women  to  do  a  great  work  in  the  moulding 
of  the  new  society  of  the  West,  and  at  the 
same  time  find  congenial  avenues  of  action,  is 
greatest  in  our  educational  institutions. 

In  such  spheres  there  is  opportunity  for 
personal  service  without  many  of  the  objec- 
tions attaching  to  it  among  the  poor  and  crim- 
inal populations.  That  there  is  no  remunera- 
tion, or  practically  none,  is  the  greatest  honor. 
This  service  to-day  is  rendered  to  the  churches 
and  to  society  by  men  and  women  of  the  most 
heroic  self-sacrificing  spirit, — men  and  women 
who  had  to  scrape  and  struggle  to  get  an  edu- 
cation out  of  the  hard  hand  of  poverty.  Why 
should  the  sons  and  daughters  of  wealthy 
Christian  parents,  privileged  possessors  of  schol- 
arship, artistic  accomplishments,  and  refined 
manners,  not  go  forth  for  a  few  of  the  young, 
strong,  fresh  years  of  their  life  to  such  work? 

No  interest  of  our  American  national  life  is 
so  vital  as  the  higher  education  of  the  West. 
It  is  poorly  endowed,  insufficiently  manned, 
and,  beyond  all  things,  needs  the  personal  con- 
tact of  educated  Eastern  people.  Where  in 
all  the  range  of  philanthropic  service  could 
wealth  be  more  fitly  used  than  in  the  endow- 
ment of  a  Chair  to  which  a  distinguished  son 
or  daughter  could  give  the  loving,  enthusiastic 
service    of   a    cultured    mind   and   a  Christian 


PERSONAL   SERVICE.  137 

heart?  Is  it  not  a  wonder  that  the  boys  and 
girls  in  rich  homes  do  not  see  this  themselves? 
Or  is  it  because  in  our  selfish  family  feelings 
we  have  wished  " better  things"  for  them? 

What  objection  could  be  made  to  such 
a  career  for  the  most  carefully  educated,  shel- 
tered, and  treasured  young  woman?  She  goes 
among  people  of  taste  and  refinement.  She 
deals  with  students  who  are  respectful,  earn- 
est, and  devoted  to  their  instructors.  She 
will  be  exposed  to  a  thousand  dangers  amid 
the  ordinary  amusements  of  society  at  home 
to  one  in  her  work  in  such  a  college.  She  will 
be  honored,  happy,  useful,  and  fitted,  if  so 
desirous,  for  a  larger  life  and  greater  service, 
when  she  chooses  to  return  to  her  former 
home.  All  this  is  true  of  a  son  also,  with 
this  additional  advantage,  he  will  be  more 
likely  to  find  a  field  for  public  service  and  dis- 
tinction in  the  new  surroundings  than  in  the 
elegant  and  enervating  leisure,  or  business 
humdrum  of  conventional  society  life. 

We  must  now  consider  a  form  of  service  par- 
ticularly dear  to  the  church,  and  particularly 
obligatory  on  the  Christian  families  of  to-day. 
By  the  sacredness  of  our  profession,  as  well  as 
by  the  genius  of  our  religion,  we  stand  pledged 
to  missionary  work.  But  how  has  it  been 
done?     Without    doubt    it    offers   one   of  the 


13S  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

brightest  pages  in  history.  It  is  equally  true 
that  its  half-hearted  and  inadequate  support 
to-day  is  becoming  a  reproach  to  the  Christian 
name. 

It  must  get  new  recognition,  new  im- 
pulses, new  attachments  to  our  modern  social 
forces.  Its  financial  supporters  and  its  actual 
workers  are  divided  by  social  and  financial  con- 
siderations. The  rich  stay  at  home  and  give 
of  their  abundance,  the  poor  go  forth  to  the 
service  as  a  profession.  Some  of  the  noblest 
and  most  generous  rich  have  so  found  expres- 
sion for  their  sympathy  and  zeal.  Some  of 
the  most  talented  and  consecrated  poor  have 
so  found  the  happiest  career  of  service. 

But  the  vast  increase  of  wealth  in  our  Chris- 
tian homes  during  the  past  hundred  years  has 
changed  these  conditions.  Yet  we  are  still  re- 
lying on  the  old  forces.  We  are  in  possession 
of  a  hereditary  education,  wealth,  and  moral 
power,  as  a  Christian  society,  which  did  not 
exist  when  we  first  sent  missionaries  abroad, 
and  reached  our  Gospel  hands  across  the  Mis- 
sissippi. We  have  not  only  faith  and  zeal  to- 
day, but  we  have  cultured  sons  and  daughters. 
The  world  needs  them,  and  they  need  to  bring 
the  treasures  of  their  lives  into  contact  with 
the  ignorant  and  the  suffering  at  home  and 
abroad. 


PERSONAL   SERVICE.  139 

The  church  has  not  yet  been  able  to  bring 
to  bear  upon  the  children  of  her  own  homes 
the  constraint  of  love  and  the  fascination  of 
interest  in  the  cause  of  missions  which  the 
State  and  education  and  science  have  used  on 
behalf  of  their  objects. 

It  is  the  fond  and  patriotic  ambition 
of  the  son  of  wealthy  parents  in  Britain  to 
serve  his  country  in  India,  Africa,  or  China, 
either  as  soldier  or  civil  servant.  When  the 
boy  goes  out  to  this  service,  no  mother  con- 
siders it  a  sacrifice,  no  father  thinks  his  son 
has  acted  like  a  fool.  Yet  he  goes  to  face 
danger,  often  death.  He  has  to  be  largely 
supplied  from  the  parental  fortune  to  sustain 
the  honor  of  his  regiment.  He  does  not  go 
to  make  money.  He  carries  with  him  the  old 
Norman  spirit  of  roving  conquest.  He  and 
his  like  have  won  for  Great  Britain  her  Colo- 
nial Empire.  In  these  paths, — military,  diplo- 
matic, scientific,  or  adventure, — have  been 
found  the  glory  of  a  great  service.  The  spirit 
of  such  men  is  well  illustrated  in  General 
Gordon,  one  of  the  noblest  of  them  all,  who 
when  he  laid  down  his  service  in  China  proudly 
declared  "I  leave  China  as  poor  as  when  I  en- 
tered it." 

Christians  of  wealth  and  rank  consider  it  an 
honor  and  a  privilege  to  send  their  sons  abroad 


140  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

for  such  a  purpose.  To  equip  and  endow  a 
son  for  this  service  is  no  sacrifice,  no  hardship. 
But  when  it  is  proposed  to  do  the  same  for 
missionary  service,  they  reverse  every  principle 
of  their  former  action.  Foreign  service  is 
dangerous  to  health;  it  is  a  great  sacrifice  to 
send  the  young  people  from  home.  It  is  even 
considered  a  lowering  of  the  social  status;  and 
the  rich  Christian  father  who  would  boast  of 
his  son's  appointment  to  a  crack  regiment  or 
a  diplomatic  mission  would  lament  his  ordina- 
tion to  a  medical  mission  or  a  foreign  college. 
Many  a  rich  Christian  mother  would  regard  a 
daughter  as  hopelessly  lost  to  society  by  taking 
up  Zenana  work  in  India  or  medical  service  in 
China;  but  she  would  be  delighted  to  send  her 
to  either  country  as  the  wife  of  an  officer  or 
civil  servant.  Money  would  cut  no  figure  if 
social  rank  were  obtained;  climate  would  be 
robbed  of  its  terrors  if  "prospects"  were  bright 
for  a  fashionable  career. 

The  wealth  and  culture  of  Christians  are 
thus  looked  upon  as  means  to  secure  social 
distinction  for  their  possessor.  And  the  mis- 
sions of  the  church,  as  the  expression  of  mod- 
ern Christian  zeal  and  knowledge,  are  deprived 
of  the  power  which  moves  men  and  women  in 
all  other  walks  of  life.  Our  missionary  work 
still  rides  in  an  oxcart  while  our  military  and 


PERSONAL   SERVICE.  141 

civil  service  rides  in  a  Pullman  car.  The  oxcart 
has  not  resources  enough  always  to  procure 
axle  grease,  while  the  Pullman  car  boasts  a 
perfect  modern  equipment,  where  one  can 
dine,  read,  shave,  and  sleep  like  a  prince. 

Sufficient  funds  for  the  vast  scheme  of  mis- 
sionary service  in  all  its  ramifications  of  educa- 
tion, medical  work,  evangelization,  and  home 
influence  will  never  be  procured  until  the 
fountain  of  personal  interest  is  opened.  This 
can  only  be  done  by  enlisting  the  personal 
service  of  those  who  can  equip  and  sustain 
themselves  in  the  wise  and  dutiful  adoption 
of  a  distinguished  and  useful  career. 

Already  some  men  and  women  have  gone 
forth  to  service  at  the  charge  of  their  parents. 
The  people  who  undertake  such  work  need 
have  no  fear  of  the  charge  of  incapacity  to 
sustain  themselves  at  home.  Why  should 
it  be  thought  strange  for  a  parent  who  will 
spend  $10,000  on  a  son's  education  to  endow 
the  hospital  where  he  goes  to  practice  his  pro- 
fession with  $50,000,  so  that  his  son  may  per- 
form those  services  for  the  class,  and  in  the 
way  that  Jesus  did? 

The  adoption  of  this  principle  of  action 
would  revolutionize  modern  missionary  service. 
It  would  put  into  the  field  men  and  women 
exactly  fitted  for  special  work  unencumbered 


142  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

by  financial  cares,  unhindered  by  financial  lim- 
itations. Such  men  and  women  would  neces- 
sarily be  of  greater  breadth  and  scholarship 
and,  if  the  test  of  Moses  be  applied  to  them, 
of  greater  spirituality  and  earnestness. 

These  self-supporting  workers  would  com- 
mand greater  respect  from  the  people  among 
whom  they  labor.  The  great  Chinese  am- 
bassador who  asked  questions  revealed  the 
fact  that  a  man's  social  status  and  education 
are  large  considerations  with  the  heathen. 
They  would  command  the  attention  of  the 
churches,  especially  of  our  youth.  The  mis- 
sionary would  be  lifted  from  the  somewhat 
doubtful  category  into  which  he  has  been 
placed  by  the  social  notions  of  Christians  at 
home.  What  would  some  of  these  mission- 
aries like  Davis  and  Hamlin  and  Lawes  and 
Chalmers  not  have  been  able  to  do  had  they 
been  backed  up  in  their  work,  as  business  men 
are  at  home,  by  family  fortunes?  Would  they 
not  repeat,  on  a  greater  scale,  the  work  of  the 
Armenian  Princess  already  cited?  But  it  is 
not  alone  the  effect  of  such  a  use  of  Christian 
wealth  on  the  extent  and  character  of  mission- 
ary service,  but  the  effect  of  it  on  the  purity 
and  strength  of  Christianity  at  home,  that  con- 
cerns us. 

What   other  single   fact    in   the   Christian's 


PERSONAL   SERVICE.  H3 

experience  would  so  enlighten,  purify,  and 
strengthen  the  soul  as  this  contact  with  the 
actual  progress  of  the  Kingdom  through  the 
personal  service  of  our  most  honored  and  priv- 
ileged sons  and  daughters?  It  would  draw  to 
itself  the  passion  of  parental  love,  of  local 
pride,  of  college  honors,  and  of  church  attach- 
ment. It  would  open  up  a  distinguished 
career  for  the  heart  and  brains  and  privileges 
of  our  choicest  youth.  And  it  would  lift 
Christian  service  at  home  and  abroad  into  a 
position  of  success  and  distinction,  which 
would  fundamentally  change  our  thoughts  and 
feelings  regarding  it.  It  would  prevent  the 
calamity,  fast  falling  upon  the  church,  of  a  sep- 
arate caste  for  Christian  service.  It  would 
permit  the  officers  of  those  great  societies  to 
whom  we  have  entrusted  the  direction  of  this 
work  to  be  directors  and  advisers  of  the  qual- 
ity and  reach  of  statesmen ;  not  as  they  are  at 
present,  collectors  and  dispensers  of  funds  in- 
adequate to  the  meanest  scale  of  operations. 

Above  all,  it  would  divert  the  attention 
of  our  disingenuous  Christian  youth  from  the 
deadly  peril  of  heaping  up  riches  for  personal 
and  family  pride,  which  corrupt  the  soul  as 
breeding-in-and-in  corrupts  the  blood. 

That  such  a  use  of  Christian  wealth  should 
appear  to  many  Utopian,  reveals  more  clearly 


144  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

the  vast  desert  of  worldly  conformity  which 
separates  us  from  a  life  like  Paul's.  We  do 
not  think  it  strange  that  a  youth  of  rank  and 
wealth,  the  gold  medalist  of  his  year  and  the 
rising  hope  of  his  party,  should  give  up,  as 
Paul  did,  all  these  worldly  honors  for  Christ. 
But  we  do  not  expect  it  of  our  own  day,  and 
we  do  not  educate  our  children  with  this  shin- 
ing example  before  us.  It  may  not  be  amiss 
to  remind  ourselves  that  Paul's  rank  and 
wealth  and  personal  equipment  are  declared 
by  Professor  Ramsay  and  the  modern  scholar- 
ship to  be  not  the  least  important  factors  in 
the  success  of  his  marvelous  career.  And  the 
distinguished  place  which  he  holds  in  the  affec- 
tions and  thoughts  of  the  Christian  world  is 
for  a  work  more  useful  and  a  name  more  last- 
ing than  any  he  could  ever  have  won  in  the 
service  of  the  world. 


XIV. 

BUSINESS  AN    OPPORTUNITY    OF    CHRISTIAN 
SERVICE. 

In  former  chapters  we  have  considered  most 
largely  the  bearing  of  this  new  ideal  of  wealth 
upon  the  family,  education,  and  hereditary  cus- 
toms. We  must  now  apply  it  to  the  conduct 
of  business  in  the  hands  of  a  person  presum- 
ably so  educated  and  influenced. 

Here,  again,  there  is  a  certain  fascination 
about  schemes  of  profit-sharing,  socialism,  and 
other  short  cuts  to  a  temporary  solution  of  the 
social  problem  of  wealth.  But  we  have  to 
deal  with  a  matter  of  business, — not  how  we 
shall  get  rid  of  wealth  to  prevent  spiritual  in- 
jury to  its  possessor  and  to  secure  natural 
benefits  to  the  recipient  of  charity,  but  how  to 
make  accumulated  wealth  in  Christian  hands 
perform  the  necessary  functions  of  Capital  and 
promote  a  noble  Christian  character?  A  very 
large  proportion  of  Christian  men  must,  in 
modern  society,  be  engaged  in  commercial  life; 
if  they  can  not  use  the  ideals  of  Christianity 
and  lofty  citizenship  in  this  domain  of  busi- 
i45 


146  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

ness  they  are  cut  off  from  the  realities  of  re- 
ligion. 

What  considerations  of  the  higher  sort,  then, 
can  be  adduced  to  influence  a  man  who  is  in 
command  of  wealth  and  who  prefers  to  remain 
in  active  business, — the  man  who  has  not  the 
statesman's  ambition,  nor  the  necessary  knowl- 
edge of  art  or  science  to  permit  him  to  take 
an  active  personal  part  in  their  advancement ; 
the  man  whose  faculties  are  still  at  their  best, 
whose  large  knowledge  of  affairs  and  mastery 
of  some  particular  business  makes  him  a  power 
in  manufacture  and  commerce;  the  man  who 
has  made  money,  and  still  can  make  it,  whom 
neither  the  church  nor  the  world  can  afford  to 
lose  as  an  active  factor  in  wealth  production? 
Is  there  nothing  left  for  such  a  man  but  to  go 
on  turning  everything  he  touches  into  gold, 
yet  finding  no  food  in  all  these  vast  concerns  for 
the  higher  cravings  of  the  intellect  and  heart? 

The  Christian  use  of  wealth  must  deal  with 
this  man's  case  and  furnish  him  a  method  of 
action.  This  is  to  be  discovered  in  the  true 
functions  of  wealth  itself  and  the  true  object 
of  all  commerce.  Wealth  is  "the  available 
thing",  when  it  is  produced  the  whole  com- 
munity flourishes.  Commerce  is  an  exchange 
of  commodities;  trade  is  a  transaction  for 
mutual  benefits. 


BUSINESS  AS   CHRISTIAN  SERVICE.     147 

That  there  are  unfortunate  conditions  when 
the  product  is  not  fairly  shared,  and  that 
there  is  often  plethora  in  one  place  and  want 
in  another,  are  facts  outside  of  our  present  in- 
quiry. That  trade  is  sometimes  robbery  and 
commerce  cut-throat  competition  is  beside  the 
point  for  our  discussion.  But  that  a  success- 
ful business  which  is  producing  great  wealth 
for  the  owners  and  managers  of  the  concern  is 
normally  the  condition  of  prosperity  for  the 
whole  community  is  now  accepted  as  an  axiom 
in  economics.  Such  a  concern  is  a  spring  of 
water:  each  one  may  not  get  all  he  wishes 
or  thinks  he  is  entitled  to,  but  if  he  gets  any 
at  all,  he  gets  it  from  the  spring;  for  the 
spring  is  the  very  condition  which  creates  the 
oasis  in  the  desert.  We  can  deal  here  only 
with  normal  conditions  of  business  to  which 
we  can  apply  the  laws  of  the  spiritual  life. 

Capital  in  the  hands  of  a  man  who  wishes 
to  use  his  wealth  for  the  higher  ends  of  life 
may  therefore  be  regarded  as  a  power  for  the 
benefit  of  society.  Not  as  philanthropy,  but 
as  business.  He  proposes  to  use  his  business 
ability  for  the  enlargement  and  success  of  his 
concerns;  not  primarily  because  he  is  going  to 
add  thereby  to  his  wealth,  but  because  his 
business  so  conducted  is  the  material  basis  of 
the  prosperity  of  a  whole  community.     This 


148  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

is  no   dream,   but  already  a  fixed  principle  in 
the  life  of  some  business  men.     Nor  is  it  with- 
out charm   for  many  minds  of  the  larger  cali- 
bre.     If  we   will   call  to  mind  the  large  part 
which  the  inventive  genius,  the  careful  busi- 
ness management,  the  mastery  of  commercial 
conditions  play   in  the  production  of  wealth, 
we  shall  see  that  this  service   is  of  immense 
value  to  the  community.     These  men  are  the 
captains   of   industry,    leaders    in    new    enter- 
prises, brain-workers  who  give  useful  direction 
to    the    productive    manual    labor    of    others. 
The   annals   of   modern  industry  are  crowded 
with   illustrations   of   this    fact.      Such   inven- 
tions as  Whitney's  cotton  gin,   Salt's  alpaca 
weaving,  Corliss'  engine,  McCormick's  reaper, 
Morse  and  Vail's  telegraphic  systems,  S.  Gil- 
christ Thomas'  elimination  of  phosphorus,  and 
the  Edison  electric   appliances    advanced   the 
wealth  of  the  world  by  leaps  and  bounds. 

"Sir  Lowthian  Bell,  who  writes  with  the 
highest  authority,  says  that  the  annual  'get'  of 
Cleveland  stone  alone  contained  an  amount  of 
phosphorus  which  if  released  would  be  worth 
£250,000  ($1,250,000),  but  which  as  an  ingre- 
dient diminished  the  annual  value  by  £4,000,- 
000  ($20,000,000). "*  This  problem  of  wealth 
was  solved  by  S.  G.  Thomas,  and  by  his  in- 

*"  Wealth  and  Wages  "—papers  by  the  author. 


BUSINESS  AS   CHRISTIAN  SERVICE.     1 49 

vention  alone  $21,500,000  per  year  was  pro- 
duced at  the  outset.  Similar  illustrations  of 
the  part  played  by  the  management  of  great 
concerns  abound  on  every  hand.  Thus  to  be 
able  to  increase  the  efficiency  of  natural  forces 
by  invention,  to  master  commercial  conditions, 
to  prevent  waste  by  careful  management,  to 
create  wealth  in  a  word,  as  a  general  wins 
battles,  has  as  great  a  fascination  as  states- 
manship or  conquest. 

With  the  various  economic  plans  by  which 
the  wealth  so  created  shall  be  best  distrib- 
uted among  the  people,  whether  by  ordinary 
wages,  co-operation,  or  what  not,  it  is  not 
necessary  for  us  to  deal.  This  will  depend 
entirely  upon  the  local  conditions  of  the  own- 
ers and  laborers,  upon  character,  skill,  perma- 
nence of  residence,  and  trade  customs,  which 
entirely  govern  such  questions.  It  is  sufficient 
to  know  that  even  by  the  ordinary  wage  system 
some  seventy-five  per  cent,  of  all  created  wealth 
goes  to  the  manual  worker;  that  the  proportion 
going  to  capital,  management,  and  invention  is 
continually  growing  smaller,  and  that  going  to 
the  manual  laborer  continually  growing  larger. 
It  is  only  by  corrupt  and  illegal  interference 
with  the  laws  of  trade  and  by  personal  and 
local  vice  on  the  part  of  owners  or  workers  in 
industrial  concerns  that  this  law  is  hindered. 


150  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

But  a  concern  conducted  for  such  high  ends 
as  in  the  case  supposed  by  us  will  increase  the 
proportion  rather  than  diminish  it,  even  when 
no  extraordinary  or  special  schemes  are 
adopted.  Where,  however,  such  a  spirit  pre- 
vails in  the  operation  of  great  business  enter- 
prises, all  practical  and  just  plans  for  the  bet- 
ter sharing  of  products  will  be  welcomed  and 
fostered.  This  also  brings  its  own  commercial 
reward,  and  such  concerns  as  can  be  run  on 
lines  of  profit-sharing  have  frequently  resulted 
in  greater  accumulations  of  wealth.  They 
result  also  in  what  is  of  greater  value  to  the 
social  and  religious  life, — in  more  intelligent, 
more  skilled,  and  more  virtuous  workmen. 

Such  a  purpose  in  business  makes  the 
desert  rejoice  and  blossom  as  the  rose.  It 
must  be  observed  in  estimating  the  value  of 
this  ideal  of  business,  that  it  demands  for  its 
success  the  possession  of  accumulated  wealth, 
not  merely  in  the  form  of  capital  to  be  used 
in  the  business,  but  the  family  heritage  which 
has  come  in  the  shape  of  education  and  the 
start  in  life.  In  the  case  of  men  who  have  ac- 
cumulated wealth  in  their  own  lifetime  so  re- 
garding business  at  a  later  period  in  their 
career  there  is  no  real  exception  to  the  prin- 
ciple.    If  it  has  not  operated  on  them  in  the 


BUSINESS  AS   CHRISTIAN  SERVICE.     151 

way  here  supposed  it  will  on  their  children, 
whom  they  instruct  and  inspire. 

Again  we  are  to  observe  that  it  permits 
the  full  normal  operation  of  business  prin- 
ciples in  the  accumulation  of  wealth,  it  limits 
nothing,  it  denies  nothing,  it  interferes  with 
no  right  in  personal  property,  and  it  demands 
no  self-denying  ordinance  from  the  man  in 
the  prime  of  life.  It  is  possible  such  a  man 
may  regard  his  ability  to  conduct  a  successful 
business  as  the  only  means  by  which  he  can 
serve  God  and  society.  It  is  possible  also  he 
detests  and  dreads  all  forms  of  mere  charity. 
What  he  wants  to  do  for  the  benefit  of  others 
is  to  furnish  work:  to  open  the  mills,  the 
forges,  the  shipyards;  to  develop  the  natural 
resources  of  the  mine,  the  field,  the  forest.  If 
so  he  is  a  very  close  imitator  of  the  best  rulers, 
ancient  or  modern.  There  is  more  statesman- 
ship, more  religion,  in  such  an  ideal  of  business, 
than  in  half  the  laws  and  half  the  sermons. 

The  proudest  boast  of  a  prince  is  that 
he  is  the  shepherd  and  judge  of  his  people. 
The  best  government  is  that  which  spreads 
prosperity  and  fosters  manhood.  All  these 
virtues  are  compacted  in  such  an  ideal  and 
method  of  business.  Nor  is  its  operation  con- 
fined to  great  concerns:  its  spirit  can  be 
manifested  on  the  humblest  scale. 


152  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

It  is  not  necessary  for  a  man  to  put  off 
doing  good  in  this  way  until  he  has  grown 
rich  himself.  It  is  very  likely  such  an  one 
will  never  feel  its  constraint.  Few  people 
grow  generous  as  they  grow  old.  The  men 
of  public  spirit  and  large  philanthropy  felt  the 
impulse  and  generously  responded  to  it  in 
youth.  So  we  must  look  to  teaching  our 
youth  this  nobler  meaning  and  sacred  obliga- 
tion of  wealth  in  business. 

If  it  should  be  charged  against  such  an 
ideal  by  the  practical  man  that  it  is  vision- 
ary and  unnatural ;  that  the  motive  which 
impels  men  in  business  is  purely  selfish, — we 
can  only  reply:  "Granted  that  it  is  so  largely; 
yet  there  are  some  noble  exceptions."  The 
end  of  all  higher  teaching  is  to  make  the  ex- 
ception the  rule,  to  turn  the  minority  into  a 
majority.  This  is  the  way  all  reforms  have 
been  wrought,  many  of  them  far  harder  of  ac- 
complishment than  this. 

But  the  case  in  support  of  this  ideal  is  even 
better.  There  are  conspicuous  instances  where 
such  use  of  wealth  is  the  dominant  principle 
in  life.  The  owner  of  one  of  the  large  for- 
tunes in  America  has  recently  proved  himself 
the  possessor  of  ideas  of  public  utility  as  well 
as  personal  ambition  which  furnish  us  an  ex- 
ample  of  this  service  on  a  large  scale.       His 


BUSINESS  AS   CHRISTIAN  SERVICE.     153 

estate  of  ninety-five  thousand  acres  is  being 
used  to  show  what  scientific  cultivation  can 
do.  The  Secretary  of  Agriculture  reports 
concerning  this  domain  :  "That  he  had  seen  the 
most  perfect  system  of  roadways,  an  exhibi- 
tion of  landscape-gardening  that  cannot  be 
paralleled,  and  buildings  which  for  dwellings, 
stables,  barns,  dairies,  propagating  houses, 
henneries,  and  other  uses  surpass  everything 
within  his  knowledge."  He  declared  this 
great  experiment  as  important  to  the  agricul- 
tural interests  of  this  country  as  the  Federal 
Department  of  Agriculture  at  Washington. 
"This  wealthy  citizen  employs  more  men  than 
I  have  under  my  charge.  He  is  spending  more 
money  every  year  than  Congress  appropriates 
for  the  Agricultural  Department  of  the  Nation. 
His  men  are  promoted  for  efficiency  according 
to  the  most  practical  civil-service  rules.  He 
is  building  up  an  educational  institution  that 
will  be  of  the  greatest  value  to  scientific  farm- 
ers and  teachers  for  the  instruction  of  others 
in  domestic  architecture,  agriculture,  forestry, 
viticulture,  dairying,  roadmaking,  and  other 
useful  sciences.  It  is  one  of  the  grandest  un- 
dertakings that  individual  enterprise  ever  at- 
tempted; and  I  understand,"  the  Secretary 
concludes,  "that  it  is  the  owner's  intention  to 
leave  it  as  a  legacy  to  the  public." 


154  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

It  may  be  urged  regarding  the  above  illus- 
tration that  this  is  not  a  business  concern  in 
the  usual  acceptance  of  that  term,  but  an  edu- 
cational experiment.  As  such  the  question  of 
profit  does  not  enter  into  it;  and  unless  the 
owner  possessed  large  means  he  would  be 
unable  to  sustain  it. 

This  makes  the  instance  of  the  greater  im- 
portance to  our  particular  enquiry.  We  want 
to  know  if  any  normal,  unrestricted,  and  sane 
use  of  large  wealth  accumulated  in  the  hands 
of  one  person  can  be  made  of  benefit  both  to 
the  possessor  and  the  community,  for  we 
are  assured  that  the  man  thus  using  his  wealth 
is  most  certainly  safeguarded  from  the  deteri- 
oration of  character  and  the  infidelity  of  spirit 
called  worldly  conformity.  In  the  above  in- 
stance, however,  it  would  be  exaggeration  to 
say  the  experiment  was  not  conducted  on 
strict  business  principles,  each  part  productive 
and  the  whole  a  financial  success. 

Now  as  an  illustration  of  our  subject  we  have 
to  notice  that  such  a  work,  at  once  of  vast 
public  benefit  to  the  immediate  employees 
and  to  the  general  community,  could  not  be 
undertaken  nor  sustained  without  a  vast  accu- 
mulation of  wealth.  Nor  could  it  be  used  in 
this  way  under  any  principle  of  restriction, 
deprivation,  or  denial  of  the  right  of  personal 


BUSINESS  AS   CHRISTIAN  SERVICE.     155 

property.  The  virtue  then,  whatever  it  is, 
both  personal  and  communal,  arises  from  the 
successful  accumulation  of  wealth  in  the  first 
instance. 

In  addition,  however,  it  is  an  ideal  use  of 
wealth;  it  includes  the  idea  of  stewardship, 
personal  ownership,  and  personal  service;  it 
is  the  putting  of  the  owner's  thought,  feel- 
ing, interest,  and  fellowship  into  a  business 
concern.  It  is  therefore  altruism  in  business, 
based  upon  the  firm  ground  of  common  inter- 
est in  productive  occupations.  The  field  for 
character,  virtue,  public  and  personal,  is  thus 
occupied  in  such  action. 

The  social  and  business  inducements  to 
work  in  this  way  are  natural.  They  are  sus- 
ceptible of  appreciation,  it  is  true,  only  by 
those  who  have  high  ideals  and  a  deep  sense 
of  responsibility,  but  they  are  in  the  line  of 
sanity,  nature,  and  education.  They  are  such 
as  the  more  spiritual  interpretation  of  the 
Christian  use  of  wealth  is  continually  calling 
for  from  all  the  followers  of  Jesus.  They 
may  not  be  set  aside  either  as  impractical  or 
without  obligation.  More  or  less,  they  are  of 
deep  and  permanent  obligation  on  all.  And 
it  is  as  this  principle  of  business  action,  this 
ideal  of  personal  service  through  wealth,  enters 
into  all  commercial  and  professional  life,  that 


156  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

it  is  saved  from  the  taint  of  mere  self-seeking 
and  raised  to  the  dignity  of  human  fellowship. 
It  would  remove  the  canker  from  many  a 
manly  spirit  corrupting  with  the  sordidness  of 
business;  it  would  open  new  visions  of  the 
possibilities  of  wealth,  and  save  it  from  the 
terrible  indictment,  made  too  often  with  truth, 
that  its  possession  is  a  curse,  both  to  the  pos- 
sessor and  the  community. 

Reformers  are  not  without  hope  that  in 
these  latter  days,  in  a  commercial  community 
where  the  possession  of  inherited  wealth  and 
the  native  capacity  for  business  mark  men 
out  as  leaders  of  their  fellows,  such  men 
will  undertake  the  social  obligations  of  wealth 
and  elect  to  serve  the  public  in  the  leadership 
of  commerce,  education,  civic  affairs,  and  re- 
ligion. 

Nature  has  no  mercy  on  those  who  break 
her  laws.  The  forces  which  might  bring 
health  and  the  divinest  exhilaration  if  used 
at  the  right  time  and  place  and  for  their 
proper  purpose,  bring  disease  and  bitter  suffer- 
ing when  misapplied.  Wealth  is  a  force  of 
nature,  the  store-chamber  of  a  thousand  other 
forces.  Congested  in  our  heart,  the  elements 
which  should  fructify  a  province  will  destroy 
like  a  pestilence.  Misused  for  our  life  or  our 
family,  the  treasures  which  should  reach  the 


BUSINESS  AS   CHRISTIAN  SERVICE.     157 

homes  of  thousands  will  be  millstones  to  sink 
the  self-seekers  into  the  depth  of  the  sea. 

With  such  a  business  ideal  and  use  of  wealth 
the  owner  enters  into  partnership  with  Na- 
ture, secures  her  beneficent  operation,  and  sees 
her  forces  multiply  a  thousand-fold  for  the 
benefit  of  the  whole  community.  He  makes 
Nature  the  servant  and  promoter  of  moral  qual- 
ities also  in  the  realization  of  a  brotherhood  of 
business  and  the  victory  of  his  own  spirit  over 
these  vices  of  mere  possession  and  gratification. 

Christians  will  never  really  know  what  se- 
crets of  moral  and  spiritual  dynamics  are 
stored  up  in  wealth  for  a  civilized  commu- 
nity until  such  ideals  unloose  them,  as  Far- 
aday and  Thomson  have  set  free  the  energies 
of  Nature.  Nay,  they  will  never  know  the 
productive  power  of  accumulated  wealth,  the 
real  possibilities  of  capital,  until  this  moral 
energy  be  applied  in  business.  The  virtues 
and  affections  of  man  as  vital  forces  for  the 
creation  of  wealth  and  the  spread  of  civiliza- 
tion are  more  potent  in  business  than  muscle 
or  brain.  These  are  only  partly  utilized  as 
yet  The  man  who  regards  his  business  pri- 
marily in  the  light  of  a  service  for  God  and 
men,  is  revealing  the  secrets  and  setting  free 
the  forces  of  matter  and  spirit  for  the  purifica- 
tion and  enrichment  of  life. 


XV. 

THE  PERSONAL  ADMINISTRATION  OF 
ACCUMULATED  WEALTH. 

In  certain  parts  of  Great  Britain,  endow- 
ments of  educational  and  other  institutions  are 
called  "mortifications."  Death,  one  can  see, 
is  plainly  written  on  the  face  of  the  word.  It 
reminds  us  that  almost  all  gifts  from  private 
persons  to  the  public  were  legacies  that  could 
be  realized  only  when  the  testator  had  passed 
away.  There  are  many  reasons,  in  the  nature 
of  the  case,  why  public  benefactions  and  even 
private  inheritances  must  be  of  this  character. 
Lear's  calamity  is  not  an  impossible  one  to- 
day; and  there  will  always  be  cases  where 
accumulated  wealth  can  not  be  wisely  disposed 
of  till  the  death  of  the  owner  and  the  satisfac- 
tion of  his  heirs. 

But  certainly  in  the  vast  majority  of  in- 
stances, especially  in  modern  times,  wealth 
which  is  ultimately  intended  for  a  public  gift 
can  be  bestowed  during  the  life  of  the  owner. 
Then  one  of  the  noblest  emotions  of  the  hu- 
man spirit  can  be  felt  by  the  giver.  Then  one 
158 


ACCUMULATED    WEALTH.  159 

of  the  most  unique  of  services  can  be  rendered 
by  one  man  to  his  fellows — he  can  administer 
upon  his  own  estate.  He  can  not  only  live 
in  his  own  child  as  a  father,  in  his  own  book 
as  an  author,  but  he  can  erect  his  own  monu- 
ment and  animate  his  own  statue. 

This  method  of  the  disposal  of  wealth  is 
becoming  common  among  the  most  intelligent 
public  benefactors  of  our  time.  Even  now, 
in  the  West,  there  are  conspicuous  examples 
of  men  still  managing  their  business  concerns 
for  the  purpose  of  having  fresh  resources  to 
administer.  Some  of  the  most  munificent 
public  gifts  of  our  times  are  of  this  character. 
In  this  connection  the  names  of  Drexel,  Pratt, 
Childs,  Wanamaker,  Ford,  Armour,  Pearsons 
are  readily  remembered.  The  practice  will 
certainly  grow  in  favor,  for  it  appeals  to  those 
business  qualities  which  have  made  their  pos- 
sessors successful. 

What  satisfaction  is  found  in  toiling  for  life 
and  accumulating  wealth  which  the  foolish  or 
vicious  or  incapable  may  dissipate  or  turn  to 
the  confusion  of  the  giver's  memory?  Why 
bestow  a  benefaction  that  may  be  grossly  per- 
verted? At  least  for  many  years  of  the  best 
part  of  the  giver's  life  the  same  powers  which 
went  to  making  the  fortune  may  be  used  to 
conserve   it   to   the  high  ends  for  which  it  is 


160  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

designed.  Besides  all  this,  the  modern  in- 
stances, in  which  the  notorious  intention  of 
the  testator  has  been  frustrated  by  legal  tech- 
nicalities, have  made  men  of  wealth  feel  that 
the  best  will  is  one  executed  in  the  testator's 
lifetime. 

The  personal  administration  in  philanthropy 
of  accumulated  wealth  is,  therefore,  one  of 
the  most  conspicuous  ways  of  rendering  social 
service  and  at  the  same  time  saving  the  owner 
from  the  spirit  of  worldliness.  It  singles  out 
in  the  most  conspicuous  way  his  personality. 
It  proposes  no  interference  with  his  tastes  or 
his  device  in  the  disposal  of  what  is  entirely 
his  own.  It  does  what  Nature  has  already 
done,  just  reminds  him,  that  if  he  would 
really  possess  it  he  must  use  it;  that  if  he 
would  own  its  nobler  qualities,  he  must  give  it 
away.  It  reminds  him  that  wealth  corrupts, 
rusts,  may  be  stolen  in  possession,  but  is  in- 
vincible and  immortal  if  returned  to  the  public 
use. 

Now  we  are  concerned  with  the  effect  of 
such  a  method  of  beneficence  on  the  mind 
and  heart  of  the  possessor  principally.  In  the 
ordinary  gift  of  a  Christian  to  missions  or  a 
public-spirited  citizen  to  institutions  of  learn- 
ing or  city  adornment  we  presuppose  generos- 
ity,  interest  in  the  objects  benefited,    and  a 


ACCUMULATED    WEALTH.  161 

certain  magnanimity  or  patriotism.  Gratitude 
to  the  community  where  the  wealth  has  been 
made,  and  local  pride  from  birth  and  early 
avocations,  play  also  a  not  unimportant  part 
in  large  benefactions.  Such  motives  have 
been  regarded  in  all  ages  and  countries  among 
Christians  as  worthy  of  our  faith  and  expres- 
sive of  our  noblest  aims  in  life.  Under  the 
impulse  of  such  aims  men  have  been  known  to 
live  soberly,  industriously,  and  with  great  self- 
sacrifice,  that  in  the  end  they  might  confer 
upon  the  public  some  large  and  lasting  me- 
morial of  their  name  and  gratitude. 

To  some  extent,  therefore,  all  legacies  for 
public  service  ennoble  wealth.  The  intention 
anticipates  a  consecration  of  means  to  a  worthy 
purpose;  but  it  is  not  the  most  truly  indica- 
tive of  the  higher  uses  of  wealth. 

These  are  inseparably  allied  to  personal 
service  and  administration.  When,  therefore, 
the  benefactor  gives  during  his  lifetime,  and 
takes  a  personal  share  in  the  direction  of  the 
objects  he  is  endowing,  he  becomes  a  fellow- 
worker  in  the  higher  service.  Such  an  admin- 
istrator may  not  be  an  artist,  yet  he  may  see 
with  his  own  eyes  some  great  masterpiece 
which  his  wealth  helped  to  create.  He  may 
not  be  an  astronomer  or  physicist,  yet  he  may 
learn  the  secrets  of  Nature  which  his  wealth 


1 62  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

helped  to  lay  bare.  He  may  not  be  a 
preacher,  yet  he  may  see  the  man  redeemed, 
sitting  clothed  and  in  his  right  mind,  which 
his  wealth  helped  to  regenerate.  He  may  not 
be  a  physician,  yet  he  may  look  into  the  grate- 
ful eyes  of  those  who  have  got  healing  and 
strength  in  the  hospital  which  his  wealth 
founded.  Nay,  he  may  make  the  greatest  of 
all  human  boasts,  and  that  too  in  a  spirit  of 
praise  rather  than  boastfulness.  He  may  say 
''These  things  I  not  only  aided  with  money, 
but  indeed  part  of  these  achievements  I  was"  ; 
thus  his  pars  fui  will  have  a  grander  meaning 
than  the  statesman's  or  historian's.  He  be- 
comes not  only  a  munificent  patron,  but  a 
helper  and  fellow-worker  in  the  intellectual 
and  spiritual  creations  of  which  his  wealth  is 
the  material  basis. 

Here  then  is  a  vital  social  and  economical 
force  in  action  among  the  most  intensely  inter- 
esting of  all  human  concerns.  Such  men  as 
feel  its  charm  and  are  inspired  in  their  life  work 
by  it,  will  reap  its  richest  fruits  in  the  devel- 
opment of  their  own  best  powers.  They  will 
see  as  never  before  the  higher  ministry  of 
wealth :  its  varied  services  in  the  mitigation  of 
human  suffering,  the  dissipation  of  ignorance, 
the  spread  of  truth  and  purity,  the  advance- 
ment of  art,  literature,  and  science,  the  eleva- 


ACCUMULATED    WEALTH.  163 

tion  of  the  common  lot,  the  adornment  of 
cities,  and  the  progress  of  civilization  in  all  its 
forms. 

To  such  men  and  to  their  families  the  more 
personal  uses  of  wealth  will  assume  a  secondary 
significance.  Do  we  anticipate  family  disaf- 
fection as  the  result  of  such  a  disposition  of 
wealth  beyond  the  direct  control  of  the  family? 
I  saw  recently  the  daughter  of  a  man  of  large 
wealth,  who  had  made  a  gift  to  a  public  insti- 
tution, sitting  in  one  of  the  classes,  listening 
with  delighted  face,  and  herself  a  worker  in 
the  settlement  which  her  father's  money  had 
endowed.  Instead  of  quarrels  and  selfishness 
in  a  home  where  this  spirit  and  method  is 
adopted  we  might  expect  more  such  sons  and 
daughters,  themselves  honored  and  interested 
workers  in  the  institutions  which  perpetuate  a 
noble  parent's  name.  What  purer  pleasure, 
what  nobler  ambition  in  life  can  we  possibly 
conceive  than  such  a  fellowship  in  interest  and 
work  between  the  wise,  strong  father,  whose 
industry  and  genius  have  won  the  wealth,  and 
the  intelligent,  cultured  sons  and  daughters 
who  are  glad  to  share  in  its  disposal  of  such 
high  ends? 

When  some  great  life  story  is  laid  bare 
for  us  in  a  true  biography,  we  are  frequently 
startled  by  the  revelation  of  human  pity  and 


164  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

magnanimity  shown  by  a  noble  merchant 
prince  in  the  use  of  his  wealth  for  some  in- 
stitution where  a  dearly  loved  son  or  daughter 
can  take  a  personal  share  of  the  management 
or  minor  service.  Such  experiences  are  the 
nectar  of  the  gods,  nay  let  us  rather  say  the 
earnest  of  the  spiritual  fellowship  of  heaven, 
where  the  service  of  congenial  spirits  for  con- 
genial objects  is  the  very  fruition  of  the  soul. 

We  need  fear  no  lack  of  interest  in  the 
spread  of  the  Gospel  of  Christ  where  such  a 
plan  of  life  prevails.  We  need  anticipate  no 
foolish,  vain  display,  no  waste,  no  luxury,  no 
indifference  to  the  appeal  of  the  needy  and  the 
ignorant,  where  such  a  principle  rules.  We 
need  dread  no  more  the  ambition  which  de- 
stroys the  early  zeal  of  the  Christian  worker, 
no  luxury  which  puts  to  shame  our  Christian 
simplicity — nothing,  in  a  word,  which  sows 
the  fatal  seed  of  conformity  in  the  rank  soil  of 
unconsecrated  riches. 

Ruled  by  such  ideas  we  would  find  a  deeper 
sense  of  personal  responsibility  for  the  im- 
provement of  all  intellectual  and  moral  quali- 
ties making  the  rich  man  and  his  family  more 
fit  to  share  in  this  higher  service.  By  com- 
ing in  contact  with  men  and  women  of 
ideas  and  spirituality,  they  would  respond 
naturally   to   the   ideal   and    spiritual   in  their 


ACCUMULATED    WEALTH.  165 

whole  life.  Things  of  the  intellect  and  spirit 
which  the  wealthy  and  fashionable  disregard 
would  become  real  and  familiar.  The  fatal 
cycle  would  be  broken.  The  forces  of  disin- 
tegration would  be  arrested.  Money  which 
breeds  the  maggots  of  ennui,  enervation,  and 
disgust,  when  used  for  mere  selfish  indulgence, 
begets  zest,  strength,  and  hope  when  put  to 
the  higher  service. 

Such  magnanimous  men  and  such  homes 
would  be  the  centres  of  new  social  and  educa- 
tional forces:  they  would  occupy  the  places 
which  the  Maecenases,  the  Medici,  Wolseys, 
Heriots,  Harvards,  and  Shaftsburys  have  occu- 
pied in  the  past,  only  with  new  and  more  ten- 
der personal  relationships,  as  befit  the  changed 
spirit  of  the  times.  ''Honor  to  whom  honor 
is  due,"  is  one  of  the  exhortations  of  Scrip- 
ture. There  would  be  no  disposition  in  the 
heart  of  a  grateful  people  to  withhold  the  meed 
of  praise  to  lives  so  consecrated  to  public  ser- 
vice. 

The  new  philanthropy  may  expect  to  see  a 
new  race  of  patrons  of  art,  science,  literature, 
and  social  reform ;  a  new  class  of  public  bene- 
factors for  the  relief  of  suffering,  the  enrich- 
ment of  public  life,  and  the  solution  of  the 
civic  problems  of  our  time  should  this  purpose 
of  personal   service   in  the  administrations  of 


1 66  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

their  wealth  once  possess  the  heart  of  intelli- 
gent Christians.  For  the  Christian  man 
charged  with  the  bestowal  of  large  means,  it 
is  one  of  the  surest  tests  of  the  real  sincerity  of 
his  spirit  and  one  of  the  most  splendid  oppor- 
tunities for  the  achievement  of  a  great  des- 
tiny. 


XVI. 

THE  FAMILY  INHERITANCE. 

The  strongest  instinct  of  nature,  as  in  the 
case  of  the  mother,  superseding  even  personal 
preservation,  is  the  preservation  of  offspring. 
This  instinct  has  been  sanctified  in  religion  so 
that  it  occupies  a  place  next  to  the  salvation 
of  one's  own  soul.  It  might  weigh  with  one 
more  than  one's  own  salvation,  as  it  did  with 
the  Apostle  Paul.  It  has  been  made  much  of 
here  by  implication,  for  it  lies  at  the  basis  of 
the  teaching — "But  if  any  provideth  not  for 
his  own,  and  especially  his  own  household  he 
hath  denied  the  faith  and  is  worse  than  an 
unbeliever." 

This  sentiment  lies  at  the  foundation 
of  all  the  laws  of  primogeniture  and  entail 
which  built  up  the  power  of  feudalism  in 
Europe.  It  is  practically  the  force  which 
dominates  all  family  life  to-day  in  Europe  and 
America.  The  feudal  chief  associated  family 
permanence,  by  a  wise  foresight,  with  the 
possession  of  land.  A  family,  like  an  idea,  if 
it  is  to  come  to  anything,  needs  "a  local  hab- 
167 


1 68  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

itation  and  a  name."  The  European  con- 
queror early  possessed  himself  of  the  land  of 
the  conquered.  He  built  his  castle  and  his 
manor,  and  took  root  in  the  soil.  He  became 
a  great  tree,  drinking  sap  and  vigor  from  the 
soil  and  air  of  the  locality. 

He  did  not  disdain  to  increase  his  family 
fortune  by  alliances  and  by  commerce  directly 
or  indirectly,  for  the  noble  was  not  unwilling 
then,  as  now,  to  sell  a  title  for  money.  If 
blood  could  not  make  money,  money  could 
buy  blood.  The  family  inheritance  was  a 
vital  necessity.  Great  names  have  perished 
from  the  peerage  because  the  family  fortune 
has  been  lost.  Great  names  to-day  are  with- 
held from  the  golden  book  because  the  for- 
tunes of  the  owners  are  not  considered  suffi- 
cient to  sustain  a  peerage.  When  a  commoner 
is  raised  to  the  peerage  in  Britain  he  must 
have  an  estate  from  which  to  derive  his  title. 
A  landless  lord  is  a  reproach  of  the  bitterest 
sort. 

When  men  make  money  in  trade,  their 
first  step  in  the  social  ladder  is  the  purchase 
of  land.  To  be  John  Smith  of  Broadacres 
is  the  first  indication  to  the  public  that  the 
wealthy  ironmaster  or  brewer  has  social  ambi- 
tions. A  territorial  title  is  the  greatest  pas- 
sion  of  the   European  to-day,  as  it  has  been 


THE  FAMILY  INHERITANCE.  169 

for     the      last     thousand    years.      Even    the 
farmer,   at  least  in  Scotland,  is  called  by  the 
name  of  his  farm.      It  is  not  "John  Baxter," 
but    "Burnbrae,"— the    name    of  the  farm— 
which    marks    his    place    in    the    social    scale. 
There   is   much   sense,    much   Anglo-Saxon 
tenacity    in    this    territorial    instinct.      It    has 
made    the   European   a  man    of    the    place — 
given  him   locus  standi  among  his  neighbors, 
and  tenants,    and   retainers.      His   duties,    his 
sports,    his  honors    were   on   his  estate.      His 
great    energies,    his    conquering    forces    were 
bred  and  nourished  close  to  the  soil.      He  be- 
came like  his  own  oaks  and  elms  in  the  parks 
of   Europe,  the  beautiful  and  dominating  fea- 
ture  of  the   landscape.     Like  all  great    crea- 
tures he  had  a  place;  like  the  eagle  he  bred 
his  brood  in  the  same  nest,  and  if  he  preyed 
upon  the  flock  he  also  added  majesty  to  the 
terrestrial  scene.     This  attachment   to   place, 
to  the  old   nest,  to  the  home  of  one's  ances- 
tors, is   a  mark   of    the    strongest    and    finest 
natures. 

Its  disappearance  in  American  life  is  one 
of  the  greatest  defects  of  our  age.  Here 
the  city  swallows  up  all  interests.  Even  the 
"old  homestead"  is  deserted  and  sold  for  a 
little  capital  to  start  life  in  the  city.  Children 
born   to  the   privilege  of  a  grand  "old  home- 


170  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

stead,"  associated  either  with  colonial  or  early 
western  experiences,  should  cherish  it  as  the 
most  precious  possession  of  life.  No  more 
certain  signs  of  deterioration  in  the  East  and 
South  can  be  found  than  the  careless  desertion 
of  the  old  home. 

Commercial  men  to-day  in  our  Ameri- 
can cities  will  sell  anything  to  turn  a  dollar. 
The  old  cradle,  the  home  where  the  children 
were  born,  and  where  grandma  died,  they  are 
only  chattels  to  be  knocked  down  to  the  high- 
est bidder.  Families  change  their  residences 
on  the  merest  whim.  They  are  here  to-day 
and  away  to-morrow  like  birds  of  passage. 

The  children  have  no  holy  associations  about 
home  places,  they  are  robbed  of  all  contact 
with  Nature,  and  the  spirit  of  reverence  for 
the  past  dies  out  like  a  forgotten  song.  The 
peasantry  of  Europe  and  the  farmers  of 
America  are  the  backbone  of  their  respective 
nationalities  principally  because  they  grow 
strong  with  the  lime  and  iron  of  the  soil ;  they 
are  rooted  and  grounded  in  the  primal  and 
natural  home  places  where  deep  intellects 
and  strong  frames  are  reared. 

The  relation  of  these  instincts  and  these 
social  customs  to  the  family  inheritance  is 
strong  and  direct.  We  see  that  a  family  in- 
heritance is  a  natural,  wise,  religious  provision. 


THE  FAMILY  INHERITANCE.  1 71 

Men  who  love  their  family  will  toil  and  save 
for  their  sake.  They  will  seek  the  means  of 
protecting  their  weak  and  dependent  ones  from 
the  rude  buffets  of  poverty.  No  greater  horror 
can  come  upon  a  wise,  tender  father  and  hus- 
band than  the  thought  of  leaving  wife  and 
daughters  unprovided  against  his  death,  and 
exposed  to  the  pitiless  shafts  of  poverty.  A 
writer  makes  one  of  his  characters  say,  in  a  let- 
ter to  his  daughter  about  his  will,  "The  Lord 
has  prospered  me,  and  there  is  more  than 
enough  for  you  and  your  mother  all  your  days. 
And  that  thought  gives  me  peace,  for  it  is  an 
ill  thing  to  see  women  wrestling  with  the 
world."  No  person  of  fine  feelings  will  fail 
to  see  the  naturalness  and  propriety  of  this 
paternal  sentiment. 

In  considering,  therefore,  the  bearing  of 
the  family  inheritance  on  individualism  and 
worldly  conformity,  we  lay  it  down  as  a  fun- 
damental principle  in  religion  and  Nature, 
that  provision  for  the  family  wellbeing  and 
perpetuation  are  prime  considerations.  Any- 
thing that  would  weaken  this  claim  of  the 
family  upon  the  provider  must  be  condemned 
as  pestilent  and  vicious.  The  members  of  a 
family  born  and  reared  in  a  position  of  afflu- 
ence and  culture  have  rights  arising  from  this 
condition  of  birth  and  education.    The  parents 


172  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

will  set  the  son  up  in  business,  provide  the 
daughter  a  dower,  invest  funds  for  his  or  her 
particular  needs  if  personal  infirmity  demand 
that  form  of  provision. 

This  principle  of  action  is  so  strongly  felt 
that  no  person  of  wealth  will  adopt  a  child, 
rear  him  or  her  in  comfort  and  educate  them 
for  a  higher  sphere,  and  then  leave  them 
unprovided  for.  Such  conduct  would  be 
regarded  as  little  less  than  criminal.  The 
instincts  of  nature,  the  common  sense  of  men, 
the  tender  love  of  the  Christian  heart  may  all 
be  relied  upon  to  secure  the  protection  of  the 
family  and  the  proper  provision  for  one's  own 
required  by  Scripture. 

But  the  moral  bearing  of  the  family  inher- 
itance on  modern  Christian  society  has  as- 
sumed quite  another  phase  from  this.  Not 
even  in  the  matter  of  worldly  amusements 
has  the  Christian  man  who  is  being  corrupted 
by  the  world,  so  openly  adopted  the  princi- 
ples of  the  world  as  in  the  creation  of  family 
fortunes.  The  ambition  of  the  vast  majority  of 
Christian  men  seems  to  be  to  pile  up  vast 
wealth  to  leave  to  children  and  even  more  dis- 
tant heirs.  Every  day  brings  its  tale  of  disas- 
ter to  such  men.  They  die  in  harness.  They 
are  spent  before  their  time.  They  toil  and 
struggle  to  amass  more  and  more  to  leave  to 


THE  FAMILT  INHERITANCE.  173 

some  one  who  shall  come  behind.  The  Psalm- 
ist gave  it  as  a  mark  of  the  worldling,  they 
"leave  the  rest  of  their  substance  to  their 
babes."  But  now  it  is  the  Christian  who 
makes  this  his  one  aim  in  life.  The  great 
mass  of  wealth  accumulated  in  modern  times 
in  Europe  and  America  has  been  accumulated 
by  nominally  Christian  men.  But  more  and 
more  if  is  bequeathed  to  heirs  to  be  held  in 
perpetuation  of  family  names  and  estates. 

A  large  part  of  such  wealth,  in  more  recent 
times,  by  some  startling  phases  of  social  life, 
is  going  over  from  America  to  Europe  to  re- 
build the  fallen  fortunes  of  the  nobility. 
What  remains  at  home  here  is  affected  by  the 
feudal  taint.  The  European  noble  was  candid 
and  open  in  his  methods  to  build  up  great 
houses.  He  invented  the  laws  of  primogeni- 
ture, of  entail,  of  hypothec,  of  game,  and 
all  the  other  class  privileges  of  the  rich  to 
secure  for  the  head  of  the  house  riches  and 
power. 

We  can  not  make  such  laws  in  America, 
but  we  are  copying  social  customs  concerning 
family  inheritances  equally  as  effective  for  the 
destruction  of  democratic  simplicity  and  equal- 
ity. Surely  a  sober  second  thought  will  show 
us  how  vain  all  this  is,  how  destructive  of  all 
the  higher  ideas  of  Christianity,  and  how  fatal 


174  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

even   to   commercial   success,   in  our    society, 
such  a  course  becomes. 

Perhaps  we  ought  to  dismiss  those  instances 
where  the  parents,  in  utter  forgetfulness  of 
their  own  professions  of  Christian  faith  and 
spiritual  ideals,  rear  their  children  in  fashion- 
able luxury,  among  idle  companions,  with  no 
thought  of  the  obligations  of  wealth,  and 
allow  them  to  look  forward  to  the  time  when 
all  the  accumulated  wealth  of  years  shall  fall 
into  their  hands  to  be  used  as  they  please. 
But  such  instances  are  so  numerous  that  they 
demand  the  attention  of  the  thinker  and  lover 
of  good  society.  This  is  the  extreme  case; 
but  it  is  symptomatic  of  the  general  practice 
of  the  wealthy  Christians  of  our  age.  In  such 
a  case  the  parent  allows  wealth  which  God 
has  given  him  as  the  fruit  of  years  of  labor 
and  the  product  of  Christian  virtues  to  be 
deflected  from  its  natural  course  of  benevo- 
lence and  perverted  to  the  most  vicious  pri- 
vate ends.  What  if  the  person  so  misusing 
the  wealth  is  one's  child.  What  if  the  time 
is  many  years  after  the  parent  has  gone  from 
earth.  Was  there  no  obligation  to  see  that 
such  wealth  should  fall  into  proper  hands  to 
be  used  for  noble  purposes?* 

*  Since  writing  these  words,  a  will  has  been  made 
public  which  contains  a  very  remarkable  vindication  of 


THE  FAMILT  INHERITANCE.  175 

But  even  in  those  cases  where  the  members 
of  the  family  adopt  their  parents'  faith  and 
spiritual  ideals,  have  children  any  right  to  ex- 
pect a  parent  to  toil  and  scramble  and  ex- 
haust every  power  of  body  and  mind,  merely 
to  add  a  few  thousands  more  to  the  family  for- 
tune? Are  men  wise  to  put  such  a  premium 
on  their  own  death?  What  object  is  served 
for  the  social  advancement,  the  business  suc- 
cess, or  the  Christian  virtue  of  a  child  when 
a  parent  leaves  him  several  millions  rather  than 
the  simple  capital  of  his  business  or  the  mod- 
est legacy  that  remains  out  of  what  he  ex- 
pected to  need  for  his  own  uses?  The  chil- 
dren's rights  have,  supposedly,  in  every  intel- 
ligent Christian  family  been  already  regarded. 
They  have  been  well  born,  well  educated,  well 
trained  to  commerce  or  the  professions,  or  to 
public  service.  They  are  companions  with  their 
parents  in  business  or  social  service.  That 
part  of  the  family  fortune  which  is  invested  in 
business  or  the  funds  or  other  commercial  con- 
cerns, they   have   their  share  in,  present  and 

the  principle  here  advanced  for  the  determination  of  the 
family  inheritance.  This  testator  discards  the  feudal 
principle  of  primogeniture  in  the  male  line,  and  substi- 
tutes personal  fitness  on  moral  and  intellectual  grounds. 
It  is  not  a  long  step  from  such  action  to  the  recogni- 
tion of  the  principle  that,  not  ties  of  blood,  but  bonds  of 
the  spirit  constitute  the  rights  of  heirship  to  a  Christian 
man's  wealth. 


176  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

prospective.  But  what  right  have  they  to 
look  for  other,  vaster,  and  still  further  accu- 
mulations, which  will  require  continued  toil 
and  business  slavery  from  their  honored  and 
loved  father? 

Of  course  they  have  none.  Perhaps  they 
are  most  eager  for  their  father  to  call  a  halt, 
to  enter  with  them  into  the  enjoyment  of  and 
higher  uses  of  what  has  already  been  secured. 
Recently  we  were  called  to  mourn  the  loss  of 
a  business  man,  some  fifty  years  of  age,  who 
had  within  the  past  few  years  amassed  in  a 
most  honorable  commercial  career  a  great  for- 
tune. He  was  a  leader  in  our  missionary  and 
philanthropic  work,  not  simply  as  a  giver  but  as 
a  personal  worker.  He  was  a  man  of  family  in 
the  prime  of  life.  He  was  a  wise  counselor 
and  a  director  of  our  Christian  interests.  But 
he  would  not  rest ;  he  would  not  content  him- 
self with  what  he  had  already  won.  He  still 
wanted  more;  Pelion  on  Ossa  piled  high. 
But  alas  for  family,  for  church,  for  public  in- 
terest, they  had  to  lay  him  away  in  an  un- 
timely grave! 

Is  not  the  very  essence  of  the  Christian  life 
lost  in  such  a  career?  Time  that  should  be 
spent  in  the  home,  in  intellectual  and  spiritual 
pursuits  with  the  family,  and  a  life  that  might 
have  been  long  spared  to  the  public  service  are 


THE  FAMILT  INHERITANCE.  177 

ruthlessly  sacrificed  to  family  greed  and  ambi- 
tion. He  loses  his  life  literally  by  seeking  to 
save  it;  he  gains  the  whole  world  only  to 
lose  his  own  soul. 

Aye,  dreadful  as  the  thought  may  be,  such 
a  father  can  never  be  sure,  even  when  he 
looks  into  the  eyes  of  those  dearest  to  him, 
but  that  some  demon  of  covetousness,  whom 
his  own  worldliness  has  begotten,  may  lurk 
behind  the  countenance  of  his  child.  May 
there  not  arise  a  wish  to  have  the  "old  man" 
away  that  the  heir  may  possess  and  enjoy. 
The  iron  entered  the  soul  of  Earl  Gloster 
when  he  thought  his  .  son  Edgar  had  writ- 
ten "If  our  father  should  sleep  till  I  waked 
him  you  should  enjoy  half  of  his  revenue  for- 
ever" ;  for  as  the  father  said,  the  ingratitude 
was  unnatural  "to  his  father  that  so  tenderly 
and  entirely  loves  him,  Heaven,  and  Earth!" 
Yet  it  is  the  tendency  of  our  habits,  as  it 
was,  in  this  case,  the  infection  of  the  times, 
to  breed  such  unnatural  vices. 

Such  conduct  is  foolish  even  from  a  com- 
mercial point  of  view — the  expectation  of 
great  riches  is  so  often  fatal  to  study,  in- 
dustry, and  character.  Society  is  strewn  with 
the  wrecks  of  men  who  might  have  been  great 
and  happy  but  for  inherited  wealth,  or  even 
its  expectation.     One  of  the  greatest  author- 


178  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

ities  on  modern  business  and  on  American 
social  tendencies  says:  "It  would  be  well  for 
the  lesson  to  be  enforced  upon  the  students  of 
your  University  that  the  ranks  of  success  in 
business  and  the  professions  are  not  recruited 
from  the  sons  of  the  rich,  but  almost  entirely 
from  the  field  of  workers."*  If  then  a  con- 
tinued success  in  business  or  a  great  career  in 
the  professions  is  the  aim  of  a  fond  parent,  it 
may  be  laid  down  as  a  certain  rule — "Do  not 
leave  your  boy  a  fortune." 

There  are  many  sociological  reasons  to 
be  rendered  for  hereditary  fortunes  in  old 
countries,  where  they  invariably  go  with  great 
estates;  for  the  estate  has  tenants,  and  the 
obligations  of  great  wealth  are  more  readily 
recognized  in  such  a  case.  The  nobleman  or 
gentleman  neglectful  of  his  social  and  moral 
responsibility  in  his  parish  is  considered  a  dis- 
honor and  a  danger  to  his  order.  But  in 
America  only  the  personal  privileges  belonging 
to  great  inherited  wealth  are  likely  to  present 
themselves.  There  are  no  tenantry,  no  de- 
pendent peasantry,  no  social  parish  obligations 
that  rest  upon  the  "lord  of  the  manor." 

In  the  social  life  of  America  hereditary 
fortunes  are  dissociated  from  all  those  hu- 
manities which  tend  to  keep  them  sweet  and 
*  Dr.  Chauncey  M.  Depew,  in  a  public  letter. 


THE   FAMILY    INHERITANCE.  179 

pure.  They  are  provocative  of  self-indulg- 
ence, a  hindrance  to  the  natural  career  of  the 
American  citizen,  and  separate  him  further 
and  further  from  the  people.  We  must  recon- 
sider this  whole  subject  of  family  inheritances 
from  every  point  of  view,  as  Christians,  busi- 
ness men,  and  citizens  of  this  great  Republic. 

Its  relation  to  our  present  enquiry  is  very 
plain  and  very  important.  The  Christian  man 
who  imperils  his  own  spiritual  interests  and 
sacrifices  his  own  higher  service  to  the  family 
and  the  State  in  amassing  wealth  for  the  sake 
of  leaving  a  family  fortune,  is  recreant  to  every 
principle  of  religion,  false  to  every  experience 
of  education  and  every  duty  of  American 
citizenship.  Unrelated  to  what  has  been  said 
about  the  Christian  education  of  the  family 
and  the  personal  service  of  men  of  means,  this 
might  appear  to  be  a  contradiction  of  one  of 
the  main  positions  of  our  theme — the  power 
of  wealth  in  social  service, — but  as  the  logical 
result  of  the  wise  use  of  riches,  the  obligation 
of  personal  service,  and  the  administration  of 
wealth  while  the  giver  lives,  it  will  be  seen  to 
be  a  consistent  outcome  of  the  whole  teaching 
of  this  work. 

We  know  that  neither  the  happiness,  the 
honor,  nor  the  usefulness  of  our  children  de- 
pend  upon  the  vastness  of  the  family  inherit- 


180  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

ance.  Every  one  of  those  interests  and  ambi- 
tions which  make  a  Christian  family  noble  and 
happy  would  be  advanced  a  thousand-fold  by 
the  just  administration  of  the  wealth  during 
the  lifetime  of  the  owner.  If  the  unreasoning 
instinct  to  leave  money  to  a  child,  without  re- 
gard to  character,  ideals  of  life,  and  use  to 
which  the  wealth  may  be  put,  is  to  be  ac- 
cepted by  Christians  as  a  paramount  obligation, 
then  the  strongest  passion  of  the  worldling  is 
the  dominant  force  in  Christian  society. 

Did  we  understand  the  higher  uses  of  wealth, 
no  such  parental  folly  would  be  possible: 
it  would  be  considered  a  reproach  for  a  Chris- 
tian man  to  pile  up  a  vast  fortune  to  gratify 
family  pride,  and  leave  it  under  control  of 
anti-Christian  ideals  of  life.  The  Christian 
ideal  would  be  to  use  wealth  as  it  was  earned 
in  the  education  of  the  family,  in  their  settle- 
ment in  life,  in  fitting  and  endowing  them  for 
positions  of  honorable  service,  and  in  the  ad- 
ministration of  the  surplus  wealth  upon  objects 
which  claimed  the  sympathies  and  co-opera- 
tion of  both  parents  and  children. 

The  children  would  thus  be  partners  both 
in  the  business  and  benevolence  of  the  parents. 
They  would  be  sharers  in  the  comforts,  the 
honors,  the  privileges,  and  ideals  of  their  life. 
Their  wealth  would  accumulate    as   much   in 


THE  FAMILT  INHERITANCE.  1S1 

moral  power  and  usefulness  as  in  material  in- 
crease. They  would  perpetuate  an  ideal  of 
life,  a  principle  of  service,  a  sort  of  moral  dy- 
nasty which  should  give  permanence  and 
splendor  to  their  name.  One  of  the  strongest 
anti-Christian  passions  of  the  ages  would  be 
met  by  "the  expulsive  power  of  a  new  affec- 
tion." 

Wealth  would  no  longer  be  an  end  in  itself, 
but  a  means  to  the  noblest  of  all  ends.  In  its 
accumulation  it  would  take  a  new  character 
and  gather  new  force,  because  of  what  it  could 
be  made  to  do  in  the  hands  of  such  possessors. 
Family  ambition  would  not  consist  in  a  contin- 
uous approximation  to  fashionable  and  worldly 
examples,  but  would  be  in  the  perpetuation  of 
great  Christian  traditions.  Noblesse  oblige,  in 
the  new  order  of  society,  would  be  the  watch- 
word of  those  who,  possessing  culture,  and 
faith,  and  wealth,  used  their  possessions  in  the 
grace  of  gentlehood  and  the  dignity  of  service, 
because  they  had  learned  the  secret  of  that 
saying  "He  that  is  greatest  among  you  let 
him  be  your  servant." 


XVII. 

THE  NEW  CHRISTIAN  CIVILIZATION. 

What  Christians  need  to-day  is  a  divine 
passion  for  righteousness  in  the  civilization  of 
their  age  and  nation.  Some  are  wise,  digni- 
fied, intellectual:  others  are  earnest,  spiritual, 
and  generous:  while  a  happy  third  mingle 
these  gracious  traits  in  healthy  proportions. 
But  there  is  a  conspicuous  absence  of  fire  and 
abandon  of  soul  in  the  interests  of  some  over- 
mastering passion  or  in  pursuit  of  some  fas- 
cinating ideal.  There  is  much  sense,  but  little 
poetry,  in  the  average  Christian's  life. 

We  hear  some  of  the  demands  made  by 
Jesus  on  the  Christian  heart  as  if  they  be- 
longed to  a  world  of  dreams  and  He  the 
splendid  dreamer.  There  is  no  predominant 
conception  of  life  and  duty  in  the  Christianity 
of  our  day  forcing  all  its  intellectual,  spiritual, 
and  material  forces  into  an  energy  which  will 
carry  the  church  to  certain  conquest  over  the 
forces  of  evil  in  the  society  around  her.  We 
have  no  dominant  creative  ideal  concerning  the 
nature  and  purpose  of  the  civilization  which, 
182 


NEW  CHRISTIAN  CIVILIZATION.       183 

consciously  or  unconsciously,  we  are  mould- 
ing. We  are  comfortable,  satisfied  with 
things  as  they  arc,  if  we  are  fairly  successful  in 
life.  We  are  ''lapped  in  soft  Lydian  airs," 
perhaps  "sunk  in  Capuan  languors."  We 
have  not  the  strenuous  note,  the  spirit  of 
heroes,  the  devotion  of  martyrs,  the  conse- 
cration of  Saints. 

There  is  a  most  alarming  and  suggestive 
contrast  between  the  listless  tone  of  the  aver- 
age Christian  and  the  quickening  enthusiasm 
of  the  various  secular  interests  of  life.  Sci- 
ence carries  its  votaries  off  their  feet  with  a 
whirlwind  of  zeal  for  the  investigation  of  the 
secrets  of  nature.  Work — eager,  incessant, 
triumphant — is  the  watchword  of  the  new 
studies  ranging  from  the  worm  to  the  stars. 
Literature  is  a  teeming  hive  of  earnest,  seri- 
ous, highly-equipped  workers ;  and  there  is 
a  spirit,  a  tang,  a  snap,  a  zest  of  life  in  all  they 
say  and  sing.  Commerce  also,  even  if  fevered 
and  overstrained,  is  energetic  and  command- 
ing, calling  forth  some  of  the  most  splendid  ex- 
amples of  creative  intellectual  activity  in  our 
time.  It  has  passed  into  a  proverb  concerning 
the  artist,  that  he  becomes  a  slave  to  the  fas- 
cinations of  art.  Statesmanship  is  but  an- 
other name  for  the  most  consuming  ambitions. 
In  all  these  realms  we  detect  the  note  of  real- 


184  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

ity,  the  keen  delight  of  the  warrior,  conscious 
of  a  noble  cause  and  animated  by  the  firm  con- 
viction of  a  successful  issue,  the  transport  of 
the  prophet  and  poet  under  the  spell  of  a  lofty 
vision  and  the  inspiration  of  a  noble  ideal. 

Such  was  the  spirit  of  the  first  Christians 
in  their  efforts  for  social  redemption.  To  re- 
gain this  strenuous  note  of  life,  to  re-possess 
this  heroic  spirit,  the  Christian  must  learn 
anew  his  obligation  to  society,  his  debt  to  the 
spiritual  claims  of  civilization.  In  doing  so 
we  will  run  no  risk  of  forgetting  our  obliga- 
tion to  the  individual,  for  the  individual  claim 
has  already  been  met,  and  out  of  it  has  sprung 
this  new  obligation. 

We  must  reconstruct  our  Christian  doctrine 
of  life  in  its  totality  under  the  pressure  and 
in  the  light  of  the  social  needs  and  teach- 
ings of  our  own  time.  Besides  the  individual, 
society  must  be  regarded  as  the  subject  of 
salvation;  for  though  the  individual  soul 
creates  society,  in  turn  society  reacts  upon  the 
individual. 

The  end  of  religion  is  a  perfect  civilization. 
Sin  exists  in  and  pollutes  the  soul  of  society 
just  as  truly  as  it  exists  in  and  pollutes  the 
individual  soul.  The  curse  of  sin,  thus  consid- 
ered, is  its  power  to  destroy.  It  limits,  de- 
prives,   destroys  all  wealth,   whether  of  souls 


NEW  CHRTSTIAN  CIVILIZATION.       1S5 

or  bodies.  And  because  it  pulls  down  and 
destroys  civilization  and  the  fruits  of  man's 
toil,  physical  and  intellectual,  it  is  thereby  a 
destroyer  of  souls. 

The  Christian  thinker  must  come,  therefore, 
to  see  that  an  ignorant,  narrow,  poor,  social 
life  is  a  degradation  of  our  Christian  manhood 
and  a  destroyer  of  souls.  This  is  only  another 
way  of  saying  that  intemperance,  unthrift, 
avarice,  license,  and  injustice  are  rivers  of 
death,  which  swell  the  great  sea  of  human 
misery  to  the  mockery  and  confusion  of  the 
Gospel  of  Jesus. 

The  Christian  requires  a  social  ideal  for 
the  work  of  to-day  which  will  give  him  the 
accent  of  conviction,  the  fire  of  a-  generous 
love,  and  "put  life  into  the  very  ribs  of 
death:"  otherwise  we  cannot  escape  the 
charge  that  our  Gospel  is  no  exception  to  the 
universal  law  of  nature  which  reveals  "the 
world  as  struggling  with  all  its  force  for  the 
destruction  of  what  it  has  itself  brought 
forth." 

Must  we  then  accept  this  judgment  of  pes- 
simism, and  read  the  doom  of  our  dearest 
spiritual  hopes  in  the  failure  of  the  Gospel  to 
regenerate  society?  Does  Christianity,  like  all 
world  forces,  "weave  her  own  shroud  and  pile 
up    the    stones  of    her   own  tomb"?     At   all 


1 86  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

events  she  will  be  tested  by  the  kind  of  civil- 
ization she  produces;  for  this  is  the  spiritual 
atmosphere  which  her  own  children  are  com- 
pelled to  breathe,  in  which  they  must  think 
and  work,  and  win  their  crown  or  meet  their 
fate. 

If  Christian  parents  should  be  content  to 
let  their  children  be  born  in  dirt  and  squalor, 
be  reared  among  the  vagabonds  and  vicious, 
and  intermarry  with  the  criminal  and  unchaste, 
they  would  be  denounced  as  apostate  and  un- 
natural. Yet  the  Christian  churches  of  Europe 
and  America  let  the  souls  committed  to  their 
care  in  large  sections  of  the  community  be  so 
born,  reared,  and  married,  and  it  does  not  ap- 
pear to  them  unnatural  or  absurd. 

There  is  apparently  a  wide  separation  be- 
tween the  rich,  cultured  Christian  who  lives 
in  the  repose  and  refinement  of  his  suburban 
villa,  and  the  thugs,  criminals,  and  outcasts 
who  herd  in  the  conjested  districts  of  our  great 
cities ;  but  there  is  no  real  separation  of  fate, 
so  far  as  history  teaches  us.  When  the  at- 
mosphere is  poisoned  with  the  deadly  small- 
pox and  diphtheria  there  is  an  equal  danger  to 
the  children  in  the  castle  and  the  children  in 
the  hut.  When  a  ship  catches  fire,  the  same 
fate  awaits  the  millionaire  in  the  salon  as  the 
pauper  in  the  steerage ;  captain  and  cabin-boy 


NEW  CHRISTIAN  CIVILIZATION.       1S7 

are  on  an  equal  footing  in  the  hour  of  common 
danger. 

The  Christian  church  will  get  back  from  so- 
ciety what  she  gives  to  society.      By  virtue  of 
our  very  faith  in  the  social  energy  of  Christi- 
anity we  are  compelled   to   admit    that    with 
what  measure  we   mete   it  shall   be  measured 
to  us  again.      If,  then,  this  civilization  which 
Christianity  has  done  so  much  to  create,  and 
which,  in  its  turn,  becomes   the  soil  in  which 
Christian  graces  are  to  grow  and  flourish,  has 
not  yet  yielded  us  much  fruit,  it  is  simply  be- 
cause we  have  neglected  the   teachings  of   our 
Lord  and  defied  the  laws  of  the  human  soul. 
Philosophers    say  that   Christian    humanity 
is  not  much  better  than  Pagan  humanity.    This 
assertion  might  be   set  aside  as  a  prejudice, 
and  the  contrary  successfully  maintained,  but  it 
clearly  proves  that  the  condition  of  humanity 
as  a  whole,  and  not  separate  atoms  here  and 
there   in   favored   places,   is  the   supreme  test 
of  the  value  of  the  Christian  gospel.     A  small 
pump  will  raise   the  level  of  the   water   in   a 
village    pond,   but  only  elemental    forces  ap- 
proaching the  supernatural  will  raise  the  level 
of  the  ocean.     Civilization  is  an  ocean.     The 
changes  in  its  character  and  spirit  require  the 
operation  of  elemental  forces  approaching  the 
supernatural.     We  must  grant  either  an  inn- 


1 88  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

nite  duration  of  time  for  the  action  of  small 
persistent  forces  or  an  infinite  energy  exer- 
cised by  some  great  force  instantaneously,  if 
we  hope  to  change  great  interests  like  society. 
It  sometimes  happens  that  these  two  kinds 
of  forces  are  combined  and  act  together. 
Christianity,  as  the  quickener  of  the  individual 
soul  and  the  reformer  of  social  life,  should  be 
used  so  as  to  bring  to  bear  all  her  regenerative 
powers  upon  the  forces  of  civilization.  Chris- 
tianity, as  the  religion  of  the  new  birth  and  of 
eternal  life,  is  an  elemental  moral  force.  Wealth, 
as  the  evidence  of  strong  personality  and  pro- 
ductive energy,  is  an  elemental  material  force. 
The  one  is  an  evidence  in  the  world  of  an 
elemental  spiritual  power  which  strikes  with 
infinite  energy  instantaneously,  and  yet  per- 
sists, through  generation  after  generation, 
moulding,  inspiring,  and  creating  civilized  life 
after  its  own  image:  the  other  is  an  evidence 
in  the  world  of  an  elemental  physical  power 
which  will  strike  as  instantaneously  and  with 
infinite  energy,  and  it,  too,  persists,  through 
generation  after  generation,  to  work  weal  or 
woe  in  the  Christian  civilization  where  it  has 
been  used.  If  these  forces,  the  spiritual  and 
the  physical  in  the  Christian  economy,  are 
divorced  and  rendered  antagonistic  by  false  or 
unworthy  ideals  of  life,  they  will  become  mu- 


NEW  CHRISTIAN  CIVILIZATION.       1 89 

tually  destructive  of  the  higher  civilization 
which  the  Saints  and  seers  of  the  church  have 
ever  aimed  to  create.  If  they  are  wedded  in  a 
noble  ideal  of  life,  rendered  sympathetic  and 
mutually  helpful,  they  become  the  parents  of 
a  divinely  perfect  human  society. 

The  economist  says,  "The  odd  thing  about 
wealth  is  the  small  impression  the  preachers 
and  moralists  have  ever  made  about  it.  From 
the  very  earliest  times  its  deceitfulness,  its  in- 
ability to  produce  happiness,  its  fertility  in 
temptation,  its  want  of  connection  with  virtue, 
have  been  among  the  commonplaces  of  reli- 
gion and  morality."*  Thus  even  on  economic 
grounds  the  demand  is  made  that  wealth 
shall  be  spent  under  the  direction  of  moral 
ideas. 

True,  the  luxury  and  display  of  the  pagan 
world,  as  seen  in  the  lives  of  Hadrian,  Lucul- 
lus,  and  Maecenas,  would  not  be  tolerated  in 
modern  society.  We  might  not  attempt  by 
violent  means  to  limit  the  possession  of  wealth, 
but  we  do  recognize  that  the  fact  of  possession 
is  a  great  moral  and  political  engine  of  power: 
we  recognize,  in  a  word,  that  the  use  of  wealth 
is  the  real  test  of  our  civilization,  and  the 
abuse  of  it  in  self-indulgence,  the  corruption 

*E.  L.  Godkin  in  "  The  Expenditures  of  Men  of 
Wealth." 


190  SELFHOOD  AND   SERVICE. 

of  justice,  or  the  perversion  of  political  insti- 
tutions is  a  menace  to  the  dearest  heritage  of 
our  civil  and  religious  life. 

This  sentiment  must  control  the  Christian, 
at  least,  in  the  use  of  his  wealth.  Although 
the  man  who  acknowledges  no  obligation 
to  Christ  and  has  no  spiritual  ideal  of  life, 
may  trust  to  the  "note'  of  the  age  for  the 
extent  and  character  of  his  expenditures. 
"Sumptuous  living  and  equipage,  a  coach 
and  six  maids  behind,"  is  no  longer  the 
"note"  of  the  higher  class  in  Europe  as  it 
was  formerly.  Fashion  herself  has  decreed 
that  the  true  gentleman  shall  have  "quietness 
of  manner,  of  voice,  of  dress,  of  equipage, 
and  the  vulgar  ostentation  of  wealth  shall  be 
left  to  the  new  rich  man." 

Now,  whether  the  man  of  the  world 
orders  his  life  by  compulsion  or  willingly  is  a 
matter  of  no  ethical  moment.  But  with  the 
Christian  this  is  entirely  different ;  the  ex- 
penditure of  his  wealth  is  an  integral  part  of 
his  character  and  the  administration  of  a 
sacred  trust.  He  must  follow  a  principle, 
intelligent  and  moral,  as  the  expression  of  the 
ideal  of  his  life,  because  his  example  fash- 
ions the  mode,  gives  the  tone,  and  animates 
the  body  politic — in  a  word,  creates  a  Christian 
civilization,  by  the  vitality  of  his  spiritual  ideal. 


NEW  CHRISTIAN  CIVILIZATION.       191 

Most  thinkers  acknowledge  that  Christianity 
alone  can  save  society  from  the  destruction 
which  certainly  awaits  it  under  a  reversion  to  an 
ungenerated  humanity.  If  the  Christians  of 
our  day  are  to  take  an  active  and  intelligent 
part  in  the  work  of  salvation  they  must  draw 
a  clear,  bold  line  of  demarcation  between 
their  ideal  of  life  and  the  ideal  of  the  man  of 
the  world.  In  general,  concerning  the  use 
and  disposition  of  wealth  there  has  been  no 
such  definite  line  and  no  such  spiritual  ideal. 
The  Christian  of  to-day,  in  the  vast  majority 
of  instances,  fashions  his  life  on  an  ideal  which 
diverts  the  forces  of  wealth  to  the  support  of 
unfriendly    and    even    anti-Christian    objects. 

In  the  cycle  of  life,  as  exhibited  by 
Christian  society,  we  see  the  fortunes  earned 
by  the  consecrated  toiler  of  one  generation 
expended  by  the  unconsecrated  reveler  of  the 
next  on  subjects  whose  very  names  are  enough 
to  make  the  godly  forefathers  turn  in  their 
graves.  It  is  not  infrequent  to  see  the  fortune 
of  a  pious  deacon,  painfully  earned  by  thrift, 
industry,  and  temperance,  wasted  by  his  de- 
scendants in  the  license  and  vice  of  Bohemia 
and  the  demi-monde.  There  must  be  some- 
thing wrong  with  our  ideals  of  life  when  the 
grandson  of  a  Puritan  scatters  the  accumula- 
tions  of  piety   in   the   support   of    a  Parisian 


192  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

actress.  This  condition  of  things  has  become 
possible  because  Christians  have  a  divided 
purpose  in  life.  They  devote  their  hearts  to 
the  Lord,  but  their  fortunes  to  their  kindred, 
who  are  very  often  not  the  Lord's  at  all,  but 
openly  inimical  to  every  spiritual  interest  sa- 
cred to  the  man  who  made  the  fortune. 

The  claims  of  civilization  are  indefinite, 
remote,  and  lack  personal  interest ;  the  claims 
of  children  and  relatives  are  definite,  near  and 
personally  interesting.  The  heir  must  be  a 
very  great  rascal  or  the  testator  a  very  strong- 
minded,  far-seeing  man,  before  the  fortune  is 
directed  past  the  tie  of  blood  and  given  to 
philanthropic  institutions.  The  fruits  of  years 
of  consecrated  toil,  the  essence  of  this  strong 
man's  personality,  the  energy  and  virtue  of  a 
Christian  life,  expressing  itself  in  the  shape  of 
accumulated  wealth,  may  by  the  mere  accident 
of  fate,  be  lost  to  the  cause  of  truth  and  prog- 
ress, and  fall  into  the  hands  of  license  and  dis- 
honor. 

Thus  the  world  for  which  Christ  died, 
which  may  be  reasonably  represented  as  the 
world  of  truth,  intelligence,  purity,  beauty, 
justice,  honor,  love — in  a  word  a  spiritual  civil- 
ization— that  world  is  not  in  evidence  to  the 
great  mass  of  even  professedly  Christian  men 
in  the  use  and  disposal  of  their  wealth.     The 


NEW   CHRISTIAN  CIVILIZATION.       193 

passion  for  such  a  civilization  has  never  yet 
taken  possession  of  their  hearts  and  minds. 
But  surely  it  is  not  impossible  for  the  Christian 
to  appreciate  the  moral  splendors  of  a  civiliza- 
tion which,  in  our  day,  has  called  forth  the 
burning  eloquence  of  poets  and  prophets,  re- 
minding us  almost  of  the  lofty  strains  of 
Isaiah  and  the  mystic  longings  of  St.  John — 
a  civilization,  too,  which  has  touched  the 
deepest  feelings  of  statesmen  and  jurists,  as 
they  trace  the  toilsome  and  bleeding  path 
along  which  humanity  has  walked  to  its  com- 
ing hope. 

Lord  Charles  Russell,  the  Chief-Justice  of 
England,  says:  "Civilization  is  not  dominion, 
wealth,  material  luxury;  nay,  not  even  a  great 
literature,  and  education  widespread  —  good 
though  those  things  be.  Its  true  signs-  are 
thought  for  the  poor  and  suffering,  chivalrous 
regard  and  respect  for  women,  the  frank  recog- 
nition of  human  brotherhood,  irrespective  of 
race  or  color,  or  nation  or  religion,  the  nar- 
rowing of  the  domain  of  mere  force  as  a  gov- 
erning factor  in  the  world,  the  love  of  ordered 
freedom,  the  abhorrence  of  what  is  mean  and 
cruel  and  vile,  ceaseless  devotion  to  the 
claims  of  Justice/'  This  definition  of  civiliza- 
tion, "the  finest  ever  framed,"  is  based  upon 
Christian  truths  and  pervaded  by  the  spirit  of 


194  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

Jesus.  For  such  a  civilization  seers  have 
dreamed  their  dreams  and  prophets  have 
uttered  their  voices,  martyrs  have  shed  their 
blood,  Apostles  have  toiled  and  spent  them- 
selves in  missionary  labor,  saints  and  lovers  of 
humanity  have  consecrated  their  lives,  and  we 
men  and  women  of  to-day,  with  such  a  glori- 
ous heritage  of  example  behind  us,  must  take 
it  to  a  warmer  place  in  our  hearts  and  as  the 
regnant  principle  in  our  spirits. 

All  noble  Christian  souls  ever  strive,  after  a 
sort,  towards  such  a  civilization.  But  like 
a  bird  with  a  broken  wing  our  flight  has  been 
little  better  than  a  scurrrying  run.  We  have 
risen  to  no  majestic  height  secure  of  our  own 
powers.  Our  unconsecrated  wealth  was  our 
broken  wing.  Spiritual  aims  were  unsupported 
by  material  forces  into  which  the  life  energy 
of  man,  as  long  as  he  is  on  this  earth,  must 
largely  pour  itself.  Life,  divided  into  hostile 
sections,  was  paralyzed  and  a  prey  to  destruc- 
tion. The  church,  with  a  spirituality  born  of 
heaven,  "has  allured  to  better  worlds"  and 
dowered  believing  souls  with  the  noblest  joys 
of  life;  she  has  strengthened  and  enriched 
mind  and  heart  so  splendidly  that  the  victories 
of  both  the  moral  and  material  world  have 
rested  on  her  banners. 

How  is  it  then  that  her  victorious  progress 


NEW  CHRISTIAN  CIVILIZATION.       195 

is  always  strangely,  unnaturally,  illogically 
arrested?  She  stops  in  her  triumphant 
career  when  she  seems  best  fitted  for  further 
conquest.  Like  an  able  general,  vigorous  in 
battle  but  lethargic  in  pursuit,  she  has  lost 
the  full  fruits  of  her  victory.  The  territory 
won  for  Christ  is  constantly  lost  again.  The 
spiritual  and  intellectual  vigor  and  enthusiasm 
which  won  character,  fame,  and  fortune  seem 
to  decay  and  die  in  actual  possession  of  the 
fruits  of  the  victory.  Like  the  chiefs  of  some 
great  conqueror,  Christians  are  virtuous,  loyal, 
brave,  self-sacrificing  in  their  poverty  when 
they  have  yet  fortunes  and  honors  to  win, 
but  become  cowardly,  disloyal,  and  luxurious 
when  they  have  wealth  and  dukedoms  to 
enjoy.  Among  Christians,  as  among  soldiers, 
it  is  not  enough  to  win  and  possess,  nor  even  to 
enlarge  and  cultivate,  the  personal  powers  in 
life — a  new  ambition  must  possess  the  soul 
thus  dowered  and  cultivated.  For  the  en- 
larged life,  the  new  powers  are  not  alone  a  new 
source  of  enjoyment — they  are  an  added  van- 
tage ground  and  a  new  responsibility.  They 
carry  in  themselves  new  laws  of  life  and  bring 
with  them  new  powers  to  bless  and  uplift  in  a 
larger  sphere,  or  powers  of  evil  to  spread  a 
wider  swath  of  ruin  and  death. 

For  this  reason  the  Christian  man  in  com- 


196  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

mand  of  resources,  whether  wealth,  social 
standing,  experience,  intelligence,  or  affection, 
must  open  his  heart  to  a  new  love,  his  spirit 
to  a  new  ambition.  The  glory  of  a  spiritual 
civilization  must  ravish  his  soul;  he  must'  come 
under  its  spell  as  a  poet  is  mastered  by  his 
theme,  feel  its  fascination  as  the  creative  artist 
yields  to  the  grace  of  his  ideal.  This  too,  not 
merely  because  it  will  add  zest  to  his  own  life 
when  the  world  begins  to  pall,  and  active  ser- 
vice in  the  ordinary  routine  of  business  has  no 
more  to  offer,  but  because  he  is  the  divinely 
appointed  instrument  for  the  accomplishment 
of  this  great  purpose  of  redemption.  He  is 
false  to  God  and  to  humanity  who  locks  up 
the  treasures  of  education,  experience,  wealth, 
in  his  own  heart  when  the  bleeding  world  is 
calling  for  their  saving  ministry. 

Moreover  if  the  Gospel  can  save  men,  inspire 
the  soul,  enlarge  the  mind,  enrich  the  spirit, 
and  give  life  so  many  successes,  so  that  a 
Christian  man  is  the  full-orbed,  normal,  and 
complete  man,  but  when  this  masterpiece  is 
finished  there  is  no  field  for  the  exercise  of 
those  rich,  large,  gracious  powers,  then  is  the 
Gospel  but  a  more  disastrous  failure  as  an  in- 
strument for  the  sublimer  end  of  a  spiritual 
civilization.  It  is  a  torso,  not  a  perfected 
statue,   and  the  eye  of  humanity  looks  with 


NEW  CHRISTIAN  CIVILIZATION.       197 

longing  at  those  noble  lines  which  prophesy 
the  glory  which  might  have  been.  We  trust 
to  see  the  dawning  of  a  new  day  in  the  in- 
creasing instances  of  men  and  women  of  the 
most  richly  endowed  natures  and  the  most 
brilliantly  successful  professional  and  com- 
mercial careers  recognizing  their  duty  to 
society  and  passionately  accepting,  with  the 
spirit  of  the  old  Confessors,  the  way  of  the  new 
service  and  the  ideal  of  the  new  civilization. 
Such  an  instance  is  that  of  John  Ruskin: 
"Refusing  the  invitations  of  the  rich  and 
putting  away  the  temptation  to  a  life  of 
elegant  ease  and  refined  luxury,  he  gave  him- 
self to  the  poor.  His  best  lectures  were 
never  given  where  English  wealth  and  social 
prestige  were  represented,  but  were  deliv- 
ered to  working  girls'  clubs  and  workingmen's 
associations.  If  Rousseau  refused  the  yoke 
of  law  and  service  upon  the  plea  of  genius, 
this  man,  by  reason  of  his  talents,  was  careful 
to  fulfil  the  duties  not  expected  of  medi- 
ocrity. No  man  has  done  so  much  to  lift 
the  veil  which  hides  the  grim  realities  of  pov- 
erty from  the  gay  dreams  of  wealth.  By  his 
life  and  example  Ruskin  has  earned  the  right 
to  speak. as  a  prophet  to  those  who  stand  upon 
the  threshold  of  the  nineteenth  century."* 
*  N.  D.  Hillis,  D.  D,,  Sermon  on  John  Ruskin. 


1 98  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

If  then  we  can  read  the  economic  lesson  of  the 
centuries  that  "Savage  nations  are  always 
poor,"  and  if  we  can  perceive  the  great  spir- 
itual truth  concerning  wealth,  that  "It  is  a 
divinely  ordained  instrument  for  promoting  the 
highest  Christian  civilization,"  we  shall  have 
discovered  the  essential  truths  which  furnish 
the  Christian  who  has  accumulated  wealth 
a  just  principle  for  its  administration  in  the 
interests  of  the  Kingdom  of  Christ  Jesus.  In 
this  case  he  will  perceive  it  to  be  a  power  spir- 
itual of  which  he  is  possessor  and  a  sacred 
trust  of  which  he  is  the  divinely  appointed 
trustee ;  and  from  these  obligations  to  his  own 
soul,  to  his  fellow-men,  and  to  God  there  is  no 
discharge.  If  Christianity  is  to  be  saved  from 
eating  out  its  own  heart,  and  vindicated  as  the 
supernatural  regenerator  of  society,  Christians 
must  loyally  accept  the  principle  of  increasing 
obligation  with  the  possession  of  increasing 
resources.  So  will  society,  as  well  as  souls, 
become  the  subject  of  its  redemptive  agencies. 

Christianity  is  being  tested  now  as  never 
before  in  the  history  of  the  world  —  not  by 
external  enemies,  but  by  lofty  ideas  and  prin- 
ciples of  action  which  she  herself  has  done 
most  to  call  into  existence.  Can  she  rise  to 
the  demand  of  the  hour?  Can  she  answer 
those  calls  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  which,  like  the 


NEW  CHRISTIAN  CIVILIZATION.       199 

Word  of  God,  "pierces  to  the  dividing  of  both 
soul  and  spirit,  and  is  quick  to  discern  the 
thoughts  and  intents  of  the  heart ' '  ?  Are  the 
followers  of  Jesus  in  the  last  decade  of  the 
nineteenth  century  able  to  submit  their  life  to 
the  dominion  of  this  lofty  and  heroic  ideal? 
Under  it  a  new  career  of  service  and  honor 
awaits  all  strong,  resourceful  souls ;  there  will 
be  new  worlds  to  conquer,  larger  plans  of  work, 
deeper  draughts  of  pleasure.  Character  would 
be  identified  with  such  an  administration  of 
wealth  and  such  a  use  of  power;  nobleness 
and  social  distinction  would  be  inseparable 
from  such  service ;  it  would  be  at  once  a  test 
of  loyalty  to  Christ  and  loyalty  to  the  Nation. 
It  would  be  a  sure  indication  of  that  passion 
for  righteousness  in  the  life  of  nations  which 
burns  up  the  baser  elements  in  souls  and  sets 
free  the  pure  metal  of  a  redeemed  life  to  enrich 
society  with  the  treasures  of  heaven.  Under 
its  refining  fires  we  should  see  the  church  of 
Christ  glow  with  the  primal  purity  of  the  Apos- 
tolic days;  its  divine  breath  would  inspire  her 
for  a  new  mission,  its  moral  energy  would  arm 
her  for  a  new  conquest.  Disciplined  by  its 
high  demands  she  would  emerge  "  fair  as  the 
moon,  clear  as  the  sun,  and  terrible  as  an  army 
with  banners." 


XVIII. 

THE  SCOPE  AND  SANITY  OF  THE  NEW  IDEAL. 

The  intelligent  reader  of  these  pages  will 
readily  perceive  that  no  appeal  has  been  made 
to  passion  and  hardly  any  to  mere  sentiment. 
Our  aim  has  been  to  present  the  sanity  and 
sweet  reasonableness  of  the  doctrine  that 
wealth  is  a  trust,  and  that  its  wise  and  Chris- 
tian administration  demands  the  exercise  of 
the  noblest  religious  character  and  the  rarest 
civic  spirit.  Our  care  has  been  to  avoid  all 
those  violent  class  prejudices  often  allowed  to 
poison  the  mind  and  to  keep  clear  of  dema- 
gogic harangues  so  often  served  up,  instead  of 
argument,  in  the  attempt  to  array  the  poor 
against  the  rich.  No  subject  is  so  delicate  of 
adjustment,  none  so  difficult  to  understand 
and  apply  safely  to  the  complex  realities  of 
life,  as  the  relation  of  Christianity  to  wealth. 
Yet  concerning  no  other  have  so  much  foolish- 
ness, violence,  and  crudity  been  spoken  and 
written. 

Some  social  reformers  can  see  nothing  but 
one  side  of  the  subject;  they  will  listen  to  no 
200 


SCOPE  AND  SAN  ITT  OF  NEW  IDEAL.    20 1 

considerations  that  have  weighed  with  men  in 
the  past,  and  predict  nothing  but  disaster  un- 
less the  economic  foundations  are  destroyed 
and  a  new  society  created  on  principles  dia- 
metrically opposed  to  and  essentially  contra- 
dictory of  the  business  and  social  life  which 
now  obtains.  But  a  subject  so  vast,  delicate, 
and  radical  as  this  cannot  be  understood  with- 
out patient  study;  it  can  not  be  settled  by  ap- 
peals to  feeling;  it  must  gain  the  reason  and 
intelligence  as  well  as  the  affections  and  the 
will. 

The  Christian  man  in  possession  of  accu- 
mulated wealth,  when  asked  to  change  his  ideal 
of  life  for  the  express  purpose  of  affecting  the 
use  of  his  money,  is  bound  by  the  strongest 
obligations  to  himself  and  society  to  ascertain 
clearly  the  scope  and  meaning  of  the  new  ideal. 
He  must  assure  himself  that  such  a  proposal 
will  not  bring  down  upon  his  own  head  a  greater 
disaster  than  the  danger  he  is  trying  to  prevent ; 
he  must  look  into  the  future  if  he  may  discern 
the  fate  of  society  as  it  would  be  affected  by 
these  new  social  and  economic  principles.  He 
can  thus  urge,  in  the  interests  of  caution, 
the  very  obligations  of  wealth  which  the  social 
reformer  urges  in  support  of  the  economic 
revolution.  Moreover,  the  persons  for  whom 
these    considerations    are   especially    intended 


202  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

are,  in  most  instances,  careful,  experienced, 
wise,  perhaps  even  shrewd,  men  of  business 
who  have  accumulated  or  retained  wealth,  and 
by  virtue  of  this  fact  are  not  subjects  upon 
whom  the  dreams  of  socialists  or  the  raving 
of  fanatics  are  likely  to  produce  much  effect. 
But  they  are  Christians,  presumably  open  to 
consider  the  reasonable  moral  obligations  which 
wealth  entails,  and  susceptible  to  the  spiritual 
ideals  of  life  which  lie  at  the  basis  of  all  really 
Christian  society,  and  must  inspire  every 
method  for  the  higher  uses  of  wealth. 

We  desire  in  a  few  sentences  to  show,  the 
leading  human  interests  involved  in  this  dis- 
cussion, and  see  how  they  would  be  affected, 
and  thus,  with  our  eyes  open  to  the  sacred 
possibilities  of  life  and  our  wills  in  generous 
surrender  to  the  new  truths  of  the  Gospel,  we 
may  open  our  hearts  to  the  best  influences  of 
our  age  and  manifest  in  our  lives  the  noble 
and  gracious  principles  of  the  teaching  and 
practice  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 

The  broad  issue,  as  stated,  is  between  our 
Christian  selfhood  and  the  claims  of  society. 
Are  they  antagonistic  or  complementary?  Is 
the  modern  doctrine  of  the  solidarity  of  the 
race  and  the  claims  of  society  upon  the  be- 
liever a  denial  of  the  hitherto  accepted  doctrine 
of  individualism?     The  question  involves  the 


SCOPE  AND  SANTTT  OF  NEW  IDEAL.     203 

fundamental  doctrines  both  of  religion  and  so- 
ciety. On  its  threshold  we  are  met  by  the 
claims  of  personality — the  individual's  rights 
to  the  development,  exercise,  enjoyment, 
and  fruits  of  his  own  powers,  physical,  in- 
tellectual, and  spiritual.  If  we  deny  these 
to  the  Christian  man  we  attack  the  doctrine  of 
personality  in  Christ  and  in  God.  Such  a 
denial  would  logically  lead  us  to  the  waste 
desolation  of  Buddhistic  nothingness  and  eter- 
nal night.  The  horror  and  despair  of  pantheistic 
pessimism,  that  life  itself  is  a  mistake  and  con- 
sciousness a  curse — yawn  before  us  in  that  dark 
gulf.  Against  the  black  horror  of  this  athe- 
istic denial  of  the  good  of  life  and  the  glory  of 
salvation  I,  as  a  redeemed  soul,  enfranchised, 
crowned  with  a  noble  selfhood  in  Christ,  assert 
myself.  The  Christian  possesses  a  selfhood 
which  carries  with  its  redemption  every  pre- 
rogative of  personality  and  manhood  into  the 
new  life  of  the  spirit.  Thus  I  stand  in  the 
presence  of  the  eternal  realities  of  God,  of  the 
Holy  Spirit,  of  the  Christ,  and  of  the  Human 
Soul.  Here  Christianity  is  positive,  assertive, 
vital,  and  aggressive. 

But  these  are  certainly  not  theological  ab- 
stractions: they  are  historical  realities  or  mani- 
festations of  life  which  bear  upon  the  concrete 
facts  of  existence ;  they  live,  think,  work,  suf- 


204  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

fer,  and  triumph  in  this  present  physical  life ; 
and  touch  our  present  interest,  in  asserting  the 
positive  possession  of  property.  It  is  not 
difficult  to  see,  therefore,  why  all  anarchistic 
and  atheistic  systems  have  attacked  the  prin- 
ciple of  the  personal  possession  of  property. 
The  right  to  own  property  is  simply  the  mate- 
rial symbol  of  the  right  to  exist,  to  know,  to 
believe,  to  enjoy,  to  love,  to  serve,  to  reign. 
It  involves  not  only  man's  right,  but  Christ's 
and  God's.  The  creator's  possessions  are 
material  as  well  as  spiritual:  "The  cattle  on  a 
thousand  hills  are  mine,"  "The  silver  and  the 
gold  are  mine,"  is  the  assertion  of  Him  who 
also  claims  the  allegiance  of  our  spirits  and 
whose  riches  are  souls. 

We  have  maintained  as  a  fundamental  princi- 
ple of  religion,  of  society,  and  of  human  per- 
sonality, that  the  Christian  man  has  a  right  to 
own  property ;  and  with  this  right  follows  its 
control,  disposal,  and  varied  administration, 
subject  only  to  the  law  of  God.  All  schemes, 
expedients,  plans,  and  laws  which  touch  this 
right  are  essentially  anarchistic  and  destructive 
at  once  of  Christianity  and  human  society. 
The  only  considerations  that  can  be  allowed  to 
modify  this  right  are  such  as  grow  out  of  the 
right  itself.  Thus,  the  strength  of  our  reason- 
ing concerning  the   administration   of  wealth 


SCOPE  AND  SANITT  OF  NEW  IDEAL.     205 

lies  in  the  doctrine  of  Christian  selfhood  and 
the  right  of  personal  possessions  which  it  car- 
ries with  it. 

Therefore  the  obligation  to  use  wealth  wisely 
and  for  the  higher  spiritual  ends  of  life  is  not 
blackmail  paid  to  society  in  order  that  the  re- 
mainder may  be  used  for  personal  gratifica- 
tion. Possession  always  involves  use,  and  use 
is  either  wise  or  unwise — it  either  blesses  or 
bans;  it  reaches  inwardly  to  the  possessor, 
and  outwardly  to  society.  To  regard  wealth 
as  a  trust,  and  to  administer  it  in  the  interests 
of  society,  is  not,  however,  a  denial  of  the 
principle  of  possession  nor  a  limitation  of,  nor 
a  concession  of  weakness  in  that  principle ;  it 
is  simply  a  perception  of  its  higher  ends  and 
uses,  and  an  acknowledgment  that  it  is  abused 
when  used  only  for  personal  gratification,  and 
that  spiritual  service  for  one's  self  and  society 
are  the  greatest  advantges  of  fortune.  For 
this  reason  the  effects  of  such  a  use  of  wealth 
must  ever  be  personal.  In  the  close  and  im- 
mediate sense  of  promoting  the  culture,  and 
strength  of  one's  own  intellectual  and  spiritual 
nature,  as  well  as  furnishing  the  stage  of  action 
for  enlarged  service  in  the  industrial  and  moral 
life  of  society  its  benefits  are  personal. 

Thus,  and  thus  only,  does  wealth  purchase 
for  its  owner  all  that  is  potential  in  it.     The 


206  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

socialist  and  unfriendly  critic  may  point  out 
that  Christianity  has  existed  now  for  nearly 
two  thousand  years,  and  not  yet  created  such 
an  ideal  use  of  wealth,  either  for  the  owners 
themselves  or  for  use  in  society.  We 
acknowledge  and  lament  the  fact  that  human 
nature  is  so  slow  in  the  larger  spiritual  appre- 
hensions; but  Christianity  is  not  by  any  means 
alone  in  this  peculiarity  of  our  defective  intel- 
lectual and  spiritual  development. 

Science  was  as  long  about  the  perception  of 
the  Creator's  thoughts  in  nature  as  religion 
was  about  his  thoughts  in  scripture  and  soci- 
ety. It  is  but  of  yesterday  that  Newton, 
Laplace,  Faraday,  Tyndale,  and  Thomson  re- 
vealed the  secrets  of  Nature.  Nature  has 
been  before  us  these  thousands  of  years  an 
open  book,  but  we  had  no  key  to  her  language. 
It  is  far  more  strange  that  her  interpretation 
should  have  been  so  long  delayed  than  that 
selfish,  prejudiced,  human  hearts,  even  after 
they  have  come  under  the  teachings  of  the 
Holy  Spirit,  should  be  so  slow  to  learn  those 
difficult  lessons  concerning  wealth,  which  not 
only  require  a  clear  head,  but  a  surrendered 
will  and  a  pure  heart.  This  is  indeed  the  fea- 
ture of  the  new  ideal  of  life  which  indicates  its 
true  character  and  far-reaching  influence. 

It  is  not  an  intellectual  proposition  which 


SCOPE  AND  SANITT  OF  NEW  IDEAL.     207 

may  be  demonstrated  by  a  process  of  reason- 
ing, and  so  left  secure  of  its  own  application 
because  proved.  It  has  not  only  to  be  under- 
stood, but  accepted,  submitted  to,  and  loved. 
It  is  at  once  an  ideal  which  appeals  to  the  most 
spiritual  qualities  of  our  Christian  manhood 
and  a  practical  plan  of  life  which  penetrates 
and  rules  among  the  details  of  our  material 
existence.  It  reaches  from  the  temple  to  the 
kitchen,  from  the  university  to  the  workshop, 
and  affects  our  most  exalted  mood  and  most 
sordid  cares.  It  goes  beyond  the  individual 
to  the  family.  It  requires  the  exercise  of  the 
free  will,  and  it  lays  its  strong  hand  upon 
heredity  and  race.  It  reverses  largely  the 
principle  upon  which  modern  society  has  built 
up  family  fortunes  and  names,  and  it  demands 
strict  personal  service  before  it  will  yield  a  bet- 
ter social  life.  It  lays  its  strong  hand  upon 
the  man's  business,  and  it  modifies  his  concep- 
tions of  fame,  comfort,  and  pleasure. 

It  is  impossible  that  such  an  ideal  could 
have  gained  large  credence,  not  to  say  accept- 
ance, under  the  conditions  which  Christianity 
has  had  to  pass  through  in  its  checkered  his- 
tory. For  many  hundreds  of  years  European 
Christianity  had  to  struggle  for  its  very  exist- 
ence; and  after  external  enemies  were  over- 
come it  still  had  to  grope  blindly,  often  amid 


208  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

tears  and  blood,  after  the  meaning  of  its  own 
leading  truths,  so  slow  of  apprehension  and  so 
hard  of  acceptance  are  the  vital  ideas  that  de- 
termine the  destiny  of  races  and  the  form  of 
civilized  society. 

Furthermore  we  are  dealing  with  a  prin- 
ciple of  human  conduct  which  requires  a  com- 
plementary knowledge  of  material  things  and 
of  human  history,  as  well  as  the  precepts  of 
divine  revelation.  The  Christian  church  had 
to  find  out,  by  a  slow,  hard  experience,  what 
wealth  is,  how  it  is  produced,  what  laws  gov- 
ern its  use  and  possession,  and  what  relation 
it  bears  to  the  civil  and  moral  life  of  the 
people,  before  she  could  begin  to  see  its  bear- 
ing upon  great  Christian  ideals  of  society  and 
the   Kingdom  of  God. 

It  is  very  significant,  that  popular  liberty, 
and  indeed  all  human  progress,  has  been  insep- 
arably associated  with  the  question  of  taxes. 
Nations  and  kings  have  both  known  that  the 
concentrated  energy  of  a  people  stored  up  in 
the  treasury  of  the  State  largely  determines 
the  matter  of  autocracy  or  freedom,  of  the 
decay  or  permanence  of  governments.  These 
struggles  in  politics,  social  life,  and  physical 
nature  had  to  arrive  at  some  quality  of  defin- 
iteness,  and  come  into  contact  with  the  ma- 
tured   thought    of    Christianity    about    itself, 


SCOPE  AND  SANITY  OF  NEW  IDEAL.     209 

before  the  relation  of  wealth  and  Christianity 
could  be  clearly  seen  and  strongly  felt.  Here 
and  there,  it  is  true,  gifted  individuals  were 
enlightened  on  such  a  theme,  as  the  sum- 
mits of  the  Alps  catch  the  rosy  colors  of  the 
morning  long  before  the  valleys  are  yellow 
with  the  light  of  the  sun.  But  we  are  treating 
of  a  principle  which  governs  nations  and  civil- 
izations— a  method  of  action  which  is  of  uni- 
versal social  application,  not  the  rapt  vision 
vouchsafed  to  solitary,  far-seeing  souls.  It  is 
not  strange,  therefore,  that  we  have  been  so 
long  in  understanding  this  claim  of  the  higher 
life,  for  the  data  from  which  alone  we  could 
reason  have  but  recently  been  gathered  from 
the  facts  of  life  around  us. 

Again  the  century  which  has  seen  the 
greatest  progress  in  political  liberty,  in  scien- 
tific research,  and  consequently  in  the  accumu- 
lation of  material  wealth,  has  also  witnessed 
the  clearest  recognition  of  this  principle  of  ob- 
ligation in  the  expenditure  of  wealth.  In  one 
sense,  the  one  is  an  accompaniment  of  the 
other,  but  that  does  not  alter  the  fact,  histor- 
ically considered,  that  the  obligation  could 
never  have  been  perceived  in  all  its  scope  and 
felt  in  all  its  power  without  those  previous 
achievements  in  civil  life  and  those  discoveries 
in  science,  combined  with  new  ideals  in  reli- 


210  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

gion  Indeed,  we  are  face  to  face  with  a  new 
epoch,  we  are  entering  a  new  era  of  social  de- 
velopment; not  because  one  particular  truth 
hitherto  unheard  of  in  the  church  and  the  State- 
is  now  discovered  for  the  first  time,  and  being 
made  the  battle  cry  of  the  reformers,  but  be- 
cause mutually  helpful  and  complementary 
truths,  hitherto  divorced  and  unfriendly,  are 
being  accepted  as  mutually  explanatory  and 
necessary  parts  of  a  great  whole. 

Selfhood,  which  is  the  right  to  possess  and 
enjoy  with  its  corresponding  obligation  to 
social  service,  is  seen  to  be,  both  in  grace  and 
nature,  the  only  foundation  of  civilized  society. 
The  fair  blossom  of  family  life  springs  from  the 
vital  seed  of  personality.  The  glorious  tree  of 
Christian  civilization  with  all  its  precious  fruits 
of  art,  literature,  science,  education  and  soul 
culture,  strikes  its  tap-root  deep  in  the  rich 
soil  of  a  regenerated  selfhood. 

This  new  ideal  of  the  Christian  life  is 
not  the  monopoly  of  a  class,  but  the  heritage 
of  all  men;  this  is  no  Utopian  dream,  but 
the  reasoned  result  of  civil  and  religious  truth ; 
this  needs  no  appeal  to  fanaticism  for  accept- 
ance or  denial,  it  just  comes,  like  the  dawn, 
into  the  open  window  of  every  receptive  soul. 
We  have  advanced  so  far  on  the  road  of  prog- 
ress   it    is    impossible    to    go  back;    all   great 


SCOPE  AND  SAN  ITT  OF  NEW  IDEAL.     21 1 

hearts  who  feel  the  people's  sorrows,  and  all 
noble  souls  who  hear  their  Divine  leader's  call, 
will  advance,  carrying  the  improved  weapon 
and  keeping  step  to  the  thrilling  music  of  the 
new  age. 

How  then  shall  we  choose  to  live  during 
those  opening  years  of  the  new  century — the 
new  millennium  —  under  the  strong,  clear, 
steady  light  which  the  age  has  brought  us  con- 
cerning the  totality  of  our  life  and  duty?  If  it 
were  a  purely  economic  subject  like  the  produc- 
tion and  distribution  of  wealth,  it  could  be  safely 
relegated  by  us  to  experts  in  political  economy 
and  to  the  general  principles  of  honesty  and 
self-interest  in  commerce.  But  the  new  rela- 
tions of  Christian  personality  to  wealth  teach 
us  that  the  production,  distribution,  and  use  of 
wealth  is  a  moral  and  spiritual  question,  an 
obligation  bearing  upon  our  most  inward  char- 
acter, and  reaching  out  to  society  and  down- 
ward through  civilized  community  life  for 
countless  generations. 

Peace  and  War,  Life  and  Death,  seem 
standing  around  in  suspense  waiting  for  the 
momentous  decision  of  the  Christian  church 
as  to  how  her  members  will  discharge  the  obli- 
gations of  the  new  era.  This  problem  cannot 
be  solved  by  artificial  attempts  to  get  rid  of 
our  wealth.     This  would  be  seeking  refuge  in 


212  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

the  old  idea  of  denial  and  lead  us  back  to  sav- 
agery and  night.  If  our  education,  skill,  and 
virtue  create  wealth  in  all  civilized  communi- 
ties, its  possession  is  a  condition  of  Christian 
civilized  life.  We  must  live  in  the  atmosphere 
which  such  powers  and  virtues  have  created. 
We  might  cut  the  gordian  knot  by  rising  out 
of  this  atmosphere,  as  the  aeronaut  throws 
over  his  ballast,  but  only  to  suffer  asphyxia 
or  to  be  frozen  to  death. 

The  Christian  problem  of  our  day  is  harder, 
because  it  carries  with  it  the  moral  and  spirit- 
ual fate  of  individuals  and  society.  It  is 
harder,  because  to  use  and  expend  is  always 
harder  than  to  earn  and  gather;  because  it  is 
always  harder  to  live  than  to  die.  It  is  harder, 
because  it  is  more  difficult  to  walk  in  the 
golden  medium  than  to  be  a  fanatic  in  religion, 
or  a  rake  and  worldling.  Christianity  has  had 
a  large  complement  of  followers,  devoted, 
holy,  intense,  spiritual  souls,  who  have  de- 
spised the  world,  risen  victorious  over  its  al- 
lurements, counted  life  itself  as  nothing  before 
the  prize  of  glory  in  their  ecstatic  vision,  and 
from  thrones  of  power  have  stepped  aside  into 
the  cell  of  poverty.  She  has  had  assertive 
natures  also, — soldiers,  statesmen,  merchants, 
scholars,  men  who  have  led  the  van  of  prog- 
ress   and    gathered    riches    and    power    and 


SCOPE  AND  SANITY  OF  NEW  IDEAL.     213 

honor.  But  she  has  had  few  who  have  com- 
bined these  features  of  life — few  who  as  work- 
ers and  fighters  have  seen  the  spiritual  potency 
of  wealth  and  power  in  combination  with 
purity  of  heart,  tenderness  of  spirit,  and  ideals 
of  brotherhood ;  few  who  as  thinkers  and  saints 
have  seen  the  material  creations  of  the  spirit 
in  combination  with  industry,  thrift,  courage, 
hope,  and  a  civic  loyalty. 

The  task  of  Christian  thinkers  to-day  is 
to  combine  these  hitherto  separated  ideals  of 
life.  We  must  find  a  principle  of  action 
which  counts  business  as  holy  as  worship,  in- 
deed as  itself  a  worship  in  the  spirit  of  broth- 
erhood and  help  which  all  true  business  im- 
plies. A  principle  of  life  which  holds  the 
forum  as  sacred  as  the  temple  and  the  work- 
shop as  holy  as  the  altar,  which  treats  the 
physical  needs  of  men  as  tenderly  and  sacredly 
as  their  spiritual  weaknesses,  and  which  draws 
no  line  of  demarcation  between  sacred  and 
secular.  A  principle  which  leads  us  to  a  gen- 
uine imitation  of  Christ  in  making  all  life 
sacred,  all  service  a  doing  of  ''the  Father's 
business."  A  principle,  finally,  which  creates 
no  gulf  of  separation  between  a  man's  private 
character  and  his  public  conduct,  which  will 
make  impossible  the  self-deception  of  the  man 
who,  intent  on  private  virtues,  is  yet  recreant 


214  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

to  public  obligations;  which,  in  a  word,  teaches 
a  man  to  see  in  the  face  of  society  the  reflex 
of  his  own  character,  and  will  use  every  re- 
source of  brain  and  heart,  of  spirit  and  means, 
to  change  that  image  both  in  himself  and  in 
society  into  the  image  of  Jesus  Christ. 

That  principle,  applicable  to  every  age  and 
condition  of  life,  is  that  wealth  (resources 
of  every  kind — brains,  affection,  experience), 
is  a  trust,  and  that  the  administration  of  such 
a  trust  is  the  most  sacred  duty,  the  holiest 
obligation  of  the  Christian  man ;  that  the 
fate  of  the  individual  and  the  fate  of  society, 
the  future  of  children,  and  the  success  of  reli- 
gion are  dependent  upon  the  manner  in  which 
this  obligation  is  met. 

This  principle  builds  upon  the  past  exper- 
ience of  the  race  like  all  sane,  safe  proposals  for 
human  betterment,  yet  it  listens  to  the  truth 
of  the  present  like  all  true  prophets  of  God. 
It  treasures  the  concentrated  wisdom  of  teach- 
ers, the  example  of  heroes,  and  the  devotion 
of  saints  who  have  served  God  well  in  their 
time,  and  makes  no  break  in  the  splendid  tra- 
dition of  noble  lives  whose  names  are  still  an 
inspiration  to  the  believer.  But  it  reads  their 
story  to  mean  that  if  we  would  follow  in  their 
footsteps  we  must  learn  the  new  lessons,  solve 
the  new  problems,  rise  to  the  new  duties,  and 


SCOPE  AND  SANITT  OF  NEW  IDEAL.     215 

enlist   for  the   new  service  to  which  the  voice 
of  Christ  plainly  calls  us. 

This  sane  and  balanced  judgment  gives  it 
life  and  the  promise  of  future  power,  as  the 
recipient  of  the  living  spirit  of  God,  teach- 
ing us  the  truths  of  our  own  age  and  help- 
ing us  to  quit  us  like  men.  It  demands, 
undoubtedly,  a  high  type  of  Christian  intelli- 
gence and  morality;  but  surely,  after  nearly 
two  thousand  years  of  teaching  and  example, 
the  Christian  church  can  furnish  that  to  her  ad- 
herents. It  demands  somewhat  of  an  acknowl- 
edgment of  failure,  and  even  gross  errors, 
selfishness,  and  slowness  of  understanding  in 
the  past,  but  shall  Christians  take  refuge  in 
pride  and  self-sufficiency,  rather  than  humility 
and  repentance?  It  summons  us  to  a  high 
and  serene  consideration  of  the  issues  of  hu- 
man life,  speaks  to  us  in  a  language  which  to 
many  yet  is  strange,  unreal,  and  idealistic,  and 
seems  to  bid  us  act  in  a  world  of  dreams. 
But  these  divine  dreams  may  be  the  grandest 
realities;  for  how  many  of  those  gracious 
teachings  on  the  slopes  of  Galilee,  read  in  the 
cold,  hard,  materialistic  light  of  our  worldly 
aims,  seem  dreams,  seen  as  it  were  by  eyes  of 
another  kind  from  ours?  Yet  those  dreams 
were  made  splendid  realities  by  men  and  wo- 
men whose  great  faith  and  great  souls  enabled 


2l6  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

them  to  enter  into  the  fellowship  of  Christ's 
truth  and  service  and  suffering.  And  out  of 
those  eternal  and  spiritual  realities  of  his 
teaching,  who  was  to  the  world  but  a  dreamer 
and  defeated  man,  were  born  the  moral  purity, 
intellectual  vitality,  social  and  family  affection, 
and  spirit  of  liberty,  which  saved  Europe  from 
corruption,  despair,  and  anarchy.  Out  of 
these  things  have  sprung  the  new  manhood 
and  womanhood,  the  love  of  ordered  freedom, 
and  the  Kingdom  of  God  which  is  to-day  the 
refuge  and  hope  of  all  despairing  as  well  as 
aspiring  souls. 

Therefore  let  not  the  practical  man  of 
the  world  despise  our  dreams:  in  his  heart  of 
hearts  he  longs  for  their  realization;  in  the 
dreary  prosaic  monotony  of  his  life  they  are  the 
promise  of  color  and  music  and  grace  and 
sweetness,  entering  into  his  soul  to  lead  him 
up  to  the  threshold  of  heaven.  Let  him  enter 
there  through  the  blood  of  Christ,  and  learn 
for  himself  the  meaning  of  the  dream. 

We  shall  come  under  the  guidance  of  this 
principle,  to  a  new  dispensation  of  the 
spirit  which  consecrates  all  material  things, 
as  if  the  Divine  Master  said  to  us  anew 
"  Gather  up  the  fragments  that  nothing  be 
lost."  Has  the  church  not  lost  for  the  ma- 
terial  comfort   of   life   much  of   the  resources 


SCOPE  AND  SANITY  OF  NEW  IDEAL.     217 

which  her  Divine  Head  created  by  His  power 
over  the  physical  conditions  of  life?  Led  by 
the  teaching  of  such  a  truth  we  shall  feel 
new  tenderness  and  sympathy  for  every  form 
of  human  suffering  and  sorrow,  and  new 
sacredness  for  every  form  of  human  life, 
whether  rich  or  poor.  It  will  create  an  in- 
timacy and  friendship,  unknown  before,  be- 
tween the  sordid  drudgery  and  toil  of  the 
laborer  and  the  lofty  aspirations  of  the  seer, 
between  the  cold  calculations  of  the  man 
of  business  and  the  devout  enthusiasm  of  the 
saint.  Nay,  this  shall  help  to  rob  the  toil  of 
its  sordidness  and  give  it  spiritual  dignity;  it 
shall  bring  into  business  the  holy  warmth  of  a 
serving  son  of  God.  This  principle  of  life 
shall  be  a  new  spirit  moving  in  the  common 
ways  of  men,  like  Jesus  among  his  contempo- 
raries, "familiar,  condescending,  free,"  yet 
opening  our  eyes  to  the  rich  and  splendid 
visions  which  bring  the  poetry  of  great  and 
gifted  souls  into  common  clay. 

Now  this  divine  fabric  of  the  new  social 
order  is  reared  on  the  firm  foundation  of 
the  physical  nature  around  us,  on  the  family 
life,  the  home,  the  school,  the  common  ways  of 
trade  and  art  and  science  and  music  and  lit- 
erature. It  demands  for  its  realization  no 
fanatical  or  impossible  vagary  of  the  intellect 


218  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

or  spirit,  no  violence  to  the  elemental  and 
normal  powers  of  the  body  or  the  soul.  It 
will  come  into  our  homes  a  wise,  gracious 
friend ;  it  will  nourish  our  kindred  with  its 
love,  and  adorn  our  life  with  taste  and  refine- 
ment. It  threatens  no  revolution  nor  destruc- 
tion of  interests  which  religion  and  nature 
both  tell  us  should  ever  be  sacred.  It  sets  no 
bounds  to  progress,  but  rather  promises,  with 
the  accession  of  a  new  vital  force,  a  renas- 
cence of  creative  power  in  every  department 
of  human  activity.  It  has  all  the  marks  of  a 
natural,  inevitable,  and  resistless  movement  of 
the  mind  and  spirit. 

Every  candid  man  we  hopefully  believe,  de- 
sires its  realization,  and  we  only  regret  that 
our  weakness  and  selfishness  may  hinder  its 
sway  over  all  our  life.  We  feel  its  breath 
upon  our  fevered  temples  as  the  hope  of  im- 
mortality came  to  the  jaded,  skeptical  Roman 
world  in  the  days  of  Christ.  We,  too,  are  in 
the  exhausted  period  that  precedes  transition 
into  a  stronger,  nobler  life.  We  have  lost 
many  things,  and  others  still  have  lost  their 
definiteness  of  outline,  their  power  of  carrying 
conviction  to  our  minds  and  fascination  over 
our  hearts.  We  do  not  believe  and  love  as 
men  who  live  near  Nature  and  close  to  the 
heart  of  humanity,  men  who  honor  great  deeds 


SCOPE  AND  SAN  ITT  OF  NEW  IDEAL.     219 

and  suffer  in  silence,  for  these  traits  are  be- 
coming rarer  among  us. 

Yet  more  in  practical  life  the  acceptance  of 
this  obligation  would  be  a  new  vow  of  obedi- 
ence to  the  simple  teachings  of  Jesus,  a  new 
imitation  of  His  example  and  a  new  inspiration 
of  His  spirit.  It  would  renew  in  our  life  the 
simplicity  of  faith  and  the  clearness  of  truth, 
for  we  should  know  of  the  doctrine  by  His  own 
plan  of  doing  His  will.  We  should  renew  our 
hopes,  possess  again  the  joy  of  fellowship,  and 
have  the  conscious  dignity  of  walking  with 
God.  In  comparison  with  this  renewal  of  all 
the  vital  forces  of  the  soul  and  all  these  sav- 
ing influences  on  society,  how  mean  and  con- 
temptible are  the  gratifications  and  ambitions 
of  unconsecrated  wealth. 

The  Christian  man  who,  in  these  latter 
days,  shall  grow  up  into  the  stature  of  perfect 
manhood  in  Christ  Jesus  is  one  who  shall 
consecrate  all  the  resources  of  a  strong,  wise, 
regenerated  nature,  and  lay  all  its  success, 
material  and  moral,  on  the  altar  of  service 
for  his  fellow-men.  Such  an  one  will  hear  his 
Master  say  "  Inasmuch  as  ye  have  done  it  unto 
the  least  of  these  my  brethren,  ye  have  done  it 
unto  me."  He  may  look  into  the  faces  of  his 
own  children  and  lovingly  say  "I  have  done 
the  best  for  them,"  and  they  will  rise  up  and 


220  SELFHOOD  AND  SERVICE. 

call  him  blessed.  He  may  look  out  upon  the 
public  life,  and  hear  "the  blessing  of  him  that 
was  ready  to  perish"  mingle  with  the  music  of 
the  rich,  strong  voice  of  the  new  civilization, 
which  he  has  helped  largely  to  create.  Thus 
in  the  possession  of  a  Christian  selfhood,  which 
is  the  richest  form  of  personality,  and  in  the 
noble  and  inspiring  activities  of  personal  service, 
which  is  the  only  social  virtue,  he  will  attain, 
the  highest  crown  of  all  redeemed  souls — a 
holy  kinship  with  the  Elder  Brother.  He 
alone  can  truly  teach  him  the  sacredness  and 
strength  of  those  ideals  of  life  and  bonds  of 
brotherhood  which  alone  can  sustain  the 
splendid  fabric  of  a  Christian  society  and  usher 
happy  hearts  into  the  Kingdom  of  God. 


PRINTED  BY  R.  R.  DONNELLEY 
AND  SONS  CO.  AT  THE  LAKESIDE 
PRESS,      CHICAGO,      MDCCCXCVIII 


Princeton  Theological  Seminary  Libraries 


1    1012  01234  4679 


Date  Due 

m  q 

•r4CULTY 

imitf-j. 

jan  9i  ta  „ 

*■* 

<f) 

